


Doyle & Bodie - Beginnings

by Jaicen5



Category: The Professionals
Genre: First Meet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-24
Updated: 2012-03-24
Packaged: 2017-11-02 05:01:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 34,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/365268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jaicen5/pseuds/Jaicen5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How did Cowley find them, how did he recruit them, why did he partner them, what did they think of each other?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

This is my first ever fan fiction. I didn't know much about writing stories, and I hadn't any idea what a beta was at the time. I write episode based, which means the content could be filmed. This is a first time story, how they first met and were recruited. 

 

 

 

 

 

**Doyle & Bodie – The Beginning.**

**_Curiosity led me to this. How did Cowley find them, how did he recruit them, why did he partner them, what did they think of each other?  
I just had to know – Jaicen5_ **

 

 

Chapter 1

Autumn was in the air and to prove it the air was cold. A slight wind blew, stirring up the leaves around an innocuous building just off Whitehall. To the casual passerby the building looked decrepit, in dire need of some paint and repair. Few people wondered what dwelt within this building but the few that did thought it likely to house small businesses, charities, organisations that could afford little else. It certainly didn’t look the sort of building that attracted hard tough men, men that looked like they knew their business, yet a steady stream of them entered and exited that building every day. They, as well as a number of secretaries and typists, were all checked in by a security guard, who issued entry passes to those with clearance to proceed, without exception. He even checked in a middle aged dapper man fashionably dressed in a coat and tie who walked with a faint limp although he knew full well who he was. Sharp and shrewd this man was late for an appointment and his face was grim. He didn’t like to be late.

George Cowley limped into his office to find the expected small stack of files placed neatly to the left of the telephone. It was a job he insisted on doing himself, even though others had carried out the search and preliminary screenings. One couldn’t be too careful and he knew how disastrous the wrong employee would be in his organisation. It ensured that he was very careful indeed with his selection process.

Peter Banks and Andrew Morrison were waiting; both standing by the window and Cowley acknowledged them with a brief gesture to the chairs, proceeding straight to the point in his usual direct way.

“Sorry I am late gentlemen, I take it these are the candidates.”

“Yes Major” Peter Banks approached the desk, his military background plainly evident in the upright way he walked. Andrew Morrison sauntered after him, much more at ease, he was a Detective Inspector in the Met and Cowley seconded them regularly to his services, with the full blessing of the home office. He had known both for over twenty years and relied on their judgment in finding potential agents.

Cowley seated himself behind the desk and reached for the files, bringing them closer. “They’ve been screened?”

“Yes, as far as we can before the initial meets.” Morrison confirmed and sat down stretching out his legs. “Some interesting candidates in this batch Major.”

“Indeed.” Cowley took out his glasses, flipping them open with long practice and opened the first file. A large black and white photograph was pinned to the inside cover of the folder and a dark haired handsome man gazed sullenly from it. Cowley studied the photo with masked interest. Dark eyes matched the hair and the man looked hard and aggressive enough to play goalie for England. He flicked his gaze to the opposite side where crisp white pages containing details and background were meticulously typed out.

“Ex army, ex Para’s, ex mercenary, ex just about anything illegal you can think of.” He murmured to himself but Banks heard.

“I’ve seen him in action sir, moves like a cat. Knows the ins and outs of every weapon you can think of and is a champion rifleman. Military training evidently agreed with him, he’s very skilled, even though he’s been out of the service for a year or so now. Cool as a cucumber under pressure, won’t go to pieces.”

“Downside?” Cowley asked, flipping pages. The man’s employment record was well documented, but the file held very little under personal details. “What about loyalty?”

Banks almost shrugged. “Well he works for money these days, that’s his loyalty, there isn’t much more he cares about. You’d need to get past that. If you do though he’ll stay your man until the job is done.”

“And what makes you think he will want to be my man?” Cowley peered over the top of his glasses. “And is he worth it?”

Banks straightened in his chair. “Oh yes, he’s worth it Major. Smarter than he lets on, and sure of himself.” He paused before playing his trump card. “And he’s also in a spot of bother that some nice steady employment will sort out for him. He can’t leave the country just now and he’s getting caught up in things he shouldn’t be.”

Cowley lifted pages to find the current whereabouts of the man being discussed, then scanned it quickly, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “So he is. Is he guilty?”

He knew that Banks would have already checked this out with military thoroughness.

“I don’t believe so. Wrong place, wrong time. He’s been kipping at an old army mates and unaware of the illegal activities. But he was there during the bust so they took him too. A serious charge and I don’t think pleading innocent is going to help him. Not with what they found.”

Cowley flipped back to the front and gazed at the face again. The young man certainly looked capable of every deed listed in the file, and if that were so he would be a valuable agent indeed. He closed the cover of the file and put it aside.

The next file was slightly thicker and Cowley opened it to reveal a young impish face with a mass of unruly dark hair. In stark contrast to the previous file, this face was open and expressive; the wide eyes a light colour, the full lips nearly but not quite smiling. A damaged right cheekbone bespoke of some horrendous injury although the file contained no details to how it was obtained. He scanned the pages, noting the arrests, the reports, and the rapid rise for one so young, from treading a uniform beat, to CID, Drug Squad and finally the Yard.

“Good man that.” Morrison said idly as Cowley turned pages. “As damn near incorruptible as you Major.”

Cowley glanced up over his glasses. “He gave testimony in the Preston and Montgomery case?”

Morrison nodded. “Been paying for it ever since. If no one likes a bent cop, informing on one of your own comes a close second. He’s stuck at Detective Constable, same as before the Preston case. He’s been on nights for over a month now, been moved around a bit too. Giving him the dangerous stuff as well as the boring, anything anyone else doesn’t want and he’s too intelligent to be wasted like that. Got a coppers nose and good instincts. Can sniff a crim a mile away.”

Cowley digested this as he perused the file. “Finest shot in the Met with a handgun, still even now?”

He glanced up and Morrison said: “Never misses what he aims for.”

“Says he is rebellious and hot tempered, had some run ins with his superiors.”

Morrison shrugged unconcerned. “Nothing you couldn’t handle Major. He cares. Probably too much.”

Cowley looked back at the photograph consideringly, then flipped to the personal part of the file. A troublesome youth, he grew up in a mean part of a mean city, brushed on the wrong side of the law more than once. Maybe that would explain that shattered cheekbone and Cowley had no trouble imagining the horror of the incident, but it didn’t explain why he became a copper.

He closed the file and pulled the next one towards him.

********************************

Banks and Morrison accompanied him two days later as he started his initial meets. To Cowley’s mind this was an important part of the procedure. You could learn a lot about a man, when he didn’t know who you were or why you were meeting him.

The police station in a seedier part of South London looked like its surroundings. Two smashed windows had been boarded up and graffiti decorated the brickwork. The blue light by the door had long since disappeared. The Sergeant on duty looked up as Cowley approached the desk. Middle aged and greying he gave the impression he was just filling time until retirement. Banks and Morrison waited to one side as Cowley flipped open his ID.

“I’m here to see a man you have in your holding cell.”

The Sergeant took one look at the ID and visibly straightened up. He had heard of this mob and it didn’t pay to cross them. He felt a brief and irrational surge of pity for the object of their enquiries, no matter what the man was in for.

“He’s due to go to court.” he volunteered as he led Cowley down the corridor to the cells. “Likely he’ll do time, gun running is a serious business. A conviction is likely Sir.”

“Aye, I’m aware of it.” Cowley waited while the Sergeant unlocked the door. “Thank you that will be all.”

“Here, you don’t mean to go in there alone? He’s a mean one Sir.” The Sergeant looked quite alarmed and made to stop him, but Cowley gave him a frosty look.

“Och I’ll come to no harm, I’m not useless man.”

Not waiting for a response Cowley entered the cell and with a faint mutter regarding no responsibility if the top of the tree came to harm, the Sergeant closed the door behind him.

The cell was, like all police cells, bare and bleak. Scratched insults littered the walls and the floor was dirty. The smooth handsome man from the photograph in the first file was stretched out on the only bunk, managing to appear completely at ease in the narrows confines, but Cowley wasn’t fooled. He could see the coiled tension, action waiting to be released, his powerful shoulders and solid build hard and ready. The eyes remained closed, the face serene if slightly bored. Cowley was amused.

“William Andrew Philip Bodie?”

One eye opened, dark blue and black lashed. “All the Princes, I was such a regal looking baby.”

Cowley had been about to continue, but at the unexpected answer, stopped and studied his would-be agent again.

The smooth face was impenetrable, the brief smirk disappearing as fast as it had appeared, and Cowley suspected that the sudden display of flippant charm was a deliberate attempt to throw him off balance. When he made no reply, the other eye opened and both regarded him, still without any obvious interest.

Cowley was intrigued. “You’ve got yourself in a spot of bother laddie.”

The man didn’t disagree. “I’ve been in worse spots.”

“Is that so? Well I’ve come to offer you a way out of this particular spot Mr Bodie.”

“Just Bodie.”

Cowley had lifted the file. “I beg your pardon?”

“Just Bodie, don’t care much for the Princes.” Both eyes closed, the face relaxing again to its bored expression.

“I see. Well perhaps you would care to hear my offer.”

Bodie opened his eyes again, fixed them on the persistent man before him, then in a blur of motion swung both legs around and stood up. Cowley was impressed despite himself. Moves like a cat is right. His powerful build was very evident as he stood in rumpled clothes of good cut and quality and he appeared suddenly menacing although his bored expression hadn’t altered. Hard to read as well. He was giving nothing away.

“What are you? Some sort of social worker?”

“No.” Cowley tapped his glasses against his chin and his eyes crinkled minutely, privately wondering how anyone could mistake him for a social worker. “Just a means for you to avoid jail.”

“No one has that means.”

“I do.” Cowley spoke crisply.

Bodie looked him over. “Military I’d say. Sorry done my bit for Her Majesty. Can’t say she ever appreciated it.”

Smarter than he lets on. Cowley was almost enjoying this.

“This is my offer Bodie. You come and work for me, you stay out of jail. You work for me for as long as you want and you stay out of jail. I need men of particular talents, men like you, but you will be my man and nobody else’s and I need men who will obey my rules. Is that clear?”

Bodie remained standing and he remained silent though Cowley thought he saw refusal in the dark eyes. Refusal and rebellion. He’d have to push then.

“Officially you were never demobbed from the SAS. At the time it should have happened I believe you were AWOL in Eastern Europe, shall we say, pursuing your own interests? So you see Bodie, technically you are a deserter, not something the military takes kindly to. You are also implicated in an illegal gun running scheme, something the law enforcement agencies do not take kindly to.”

Bodies eyes flashed at this and his lips thinned dangerously.

Cowley kept his full attention on him, alert and watchful as though facing an uncaged tiger. “But happily for you, the army has generously decided to overlook this little transgression and instead seconded you to my department.” He placed the prepared envelope from the file on the bunk. “This is what we do, who we are, the conditions you will accept.” He gave a brief smile and this one was slightly warmer. “Consider it well, you may even find it to your liking. Your usual occupation legalised to put it loosely.”

Cowley turned to leave, but paused at the door to study his potential agent. Bodie didn’t look happy, from what he could tell, although it was hard to tell. The midnight blue eyes gazed back at him, one dark brow rose sardonically. “Not military now, then?”

George Cowley smiled but without humour. “Not even close.”

Banks and Morrison were waiting. Cowley nodded to them and led the way to the door.

“Knowing what I do of him, I’d say he didn’t give much away, including an answer.” Banks stated as he fell in behind Cowley.

“No.” Cowley allowed himself a smug smile at the questioning look on Banks’ face. “But he’s no fool either. I would say he’s ours.”

***********************

His next place of call coincidently wasn’t too far from that run down police station. It was a rough neighbourhood, but the landing at the top of the stairs gave some indication that someone cared enough to sweep it clean and there was even a potted plant in the corner. Cowley leaned on the doorbell and stood back to wait. Nothing. He leaned again, knowing that the young man in question should be in bed after his night shift, but on reflection, he was a young man and perhaps it would have first been prudent to check whose bed he was occupying.

The buzzer sounded spitefully through the interior of the flat and just as he was about to press it for the third time, the door was yanked open. The face that glared at him only resembled the photograph by way of the curly hair, riotously framing his face with tendrils almost touching his shoulders. And the damaged cheekbone, which nothing could disguise.

The impish expression, however, was notably absent. “What do you want?”

Detectives didn’t need a regulation haircut, all the better for their undercover work, but he still didn’t remotely look like a copper and certainly not one who had worked his way up the ranks to the point this young man had. He did, however, look tired and annoyed. Cowley forgave the man his ill humour. Knowing what he did of police rosters, it was likely the lad had only about three hours sleep and it certainly looked it. Bleary eyes of a light greenish-blue squinted down at him and then leaned out to check the landing in both directions, a move that Cowley approved. A careful man, despite his tiredness. He was bare-chested, wearing only a silver necklace and - judging by the undone clip and half pulled zip - a hurriedly donned pair of tatty faded jeans. His feet were bare. A small bite mark was visible on one broad shoulder and Cowley’s lips twitched. Whose bed indeed?

“Raymond Doyle?”

The tiredness vanished instantly and the door swung slightly closed, shielding him. His gaze swept Cowley’s coat, lingering under arms in an effort to spot any concealed weapon and Cowley’s approval went up another notch.

“Who’re you?”

Noise wafted down from further along the corridor and a door was opening. A cold breeze was raising goosebumps on Doyle’s bare torso. Cowley decided to move this interview along. “Perhaps it would be better to discuss this inside?”

Doyle hesitated briefly, eyes still suspicious, then almost reluctantly, stepped aside to allow entry. Cowley walked in past him and to a small lounge littered with personal items. Records, a pile of books, used wine glasses, and a nearly empty bottle. There was a trail of clothes, including women’s underwear leading from the room to a open doorway, beyond which was a rumpled bed currently occupied by a figure with noticeable feminine curves, long dark hair and an exposed flank. Cowley could smell expensive perfume and, more fainter, the evidence of some hard physical exertion. Make that maybe one hours sleep he silently corrected himself. Doyle padded noiselessly to the bedroom door, pointedly pulled it closed then turned to face his visitor, balanced easily on his bare feet, hands loose and ready, expressive face open and curious. Cowley studied him.

He was more slightly built than he would have guessed, given his line of work, almost to the point of skinniness, but that slight frame was all lean hard muscle and the man’s agility was obvious in the silent, energetic way he moved. But he had no weight. Cowley suppressed a brief flicker of doubt over Doyle being able to pass the physical and moved on to the purpose of the visit.

“My name is George Cowley.”

No hint of recognition, Doyle just waited expectantly and Cowley could see that he was tired, and the curiosity was fast turning to impatience. How on earth did the man work undercover, he was as open as a book.

“I’m the head of CI5.”

That certainly got a reaction. The greenish blue eyes blinked, the man’s finely drawn eyebrows went up and the curly head tilted as though better to digest this startling information.

“We’ve been watching you rather carefully Mr Doyle.”

Morrison and Banks were waiting by the car. Just as well too, Cowley thought as he exited the building, in this neighbourhood, it wouldn’t likely have been there for long.

Morrison opened the door. “Well?”

Cowley nodded. “Interesting young man. I think he’ll be ours. If he passes.”

Morrison smiled to himself. Ray Doyle fooled almost everyone with his appearance. Cowley was worried about the physical. Morrison wasn’t.

*******************************

**Chapter 2**

There were twelve in all. Three hadn’t been suitable on the first meet, and Cowley always went with that initial judgment. The rest sat in the briefing room now, all in various states of alertness. He watched them through the two-way mirror. Twelve healthy and fit young men. He wondered as always, how many of them would still be here in a year’s time. His initial impressions of his new agents hadn’t noticeably changed. Bodie, by the window staring out looking bored, Harley at the front, chewing gum, expectant. Tindle fidgeting with a biro, his army uniform sharp and crisp. Doyle, near the door kept glancing over to the mirror, suspicion on that open face. Cowley smiled briefly. Good instincts that boy even if his face gave him away. He moved across to the door. Time for his speech.

“CI5, Criminal Intelligence. The Action Squad, the Big A. We have one job and one job only. To see that no one messes on our doorstep.”

He paused in front of the blackboard; chalk in hand, his eyes sweeping the room. Most of the faces were focused on him. Most. Bodie was still staring out of the window as though disinterested in anything in the room. Tindle was taking notes. And Doyle. Doyle was leaning forward with a frown on his face as though displeased with what he was hearing. Cowley glanced at Bodie again, masking his irritation and went on, his slight northern burr disappearing as his voice took on a lecturer’s tone. He had done this spiel a hundred times and knew it off by heart. “By whatever means necessary.”

By the time he wound up for lunch, his small class had a very different view on what they thought CI5 was and what they did. Cowley was satisfied with the debriefing; he hadn’t seen anything he hadn’t expected to. Time enough to amend some behavioural inadequacies. After lunch they would start their training in earnest. Macklin was waiting and that would really sort the men from the boys. He knew the roster, knew that Macklin would see what they were made of before starting the training necessary to keep them alive. Cowley usually stayed in his office to write reports after the debriefing, but the memory of Ray Doyle’s slim frame had him curious as to the policeman’s physical abilities. He decided to wander down to the gym and observe.

Anderson was wheezing in a very alarming manner on a spare exercise matt and Macklin was stalking Bodie when Cowley arrived and stood unnoticed by the door. Bodie’s face was, as usual, hard to read, but his eyes were now alive and Cowley realised he was enjoying himself. He filed that little tidbit away. Bodie was a man of action, theory obviously bored him. Cowley could see enough exertion on both men to see that they had been at it for some time. He suspected that Bodies deadpan expression was making it more difficult than usual for Macklin to finish him quickly, but Macklin was nothing if not a good trainer. Tall, broad and fit, with a diaphragm made of steel, Brian Macklin had trained agents from the beginning of CI5. He was damn good at it. Eventually he would learn all of Bodie’s little tricks.

Macklin lunged and Bodie sidestepped, bringing his own arm down in a murderous swing, but Macklin suddenly wasn’t there. Bodie recovered swiftly. Cowley nodded to himself; he’d had no qualms about Bodie’s physical abilities. His powerful build and catlike reflexes were weapons that Macklin would sculpt and perfect to razor sharp. As the two men still circled, Cowley could see the various military training techniques Bodie was using and so could Macklin. It took longer than usual but eventually Bodie was on the matt.

“Predictable” Macklin declared, letting him up. “You’ll need to lose some of your training Bodie, become unpredictable.”

“Well, I haven’t had a drink yet.” Bodie said dryly, “I become very unpredictable once that happens.”

There were a couple of smirks from the watching men but Macklin had trained his fair share of cocky new agents and ignored him. “Doyle.”

Doyle walked silently onto the matt and Macklin looked him up and down. “You need feeding lad.”

Doyle didn’t reply but his face looked set and determined. Macklin started forward without warning and Doyle smartly stepped aside, but instead of using his fist as Macklin expected - as Cowley expected - he stuck out his foot and Macklin tripped. Too much of a professional to go down, Macklin spun around, surprise on his face. Cowley was surprised too. He watched Doyle with a new respect as the Detective Constable unpredictably stepped sideways instead of backwards from Macklin’s recovery. Macklin tried another tactic and Doyle maneuvered agilely around that one as well, dodging around behind and smashing a fist into one of Macklin’s kidneys. Cowley turned away satisfied, glad to see one worry appeased. Doyle was clearly a street fighter and he’d bet his best scotch he’d learned that dirty way of brawling from his troublesome formative years. He certainly wouldn’t have been taught it in the Met. Tougher than he looked, Ray Doyle.

Macklin came to Cowley’s office to give his report at the end of the session. Cowley didn’t let on that he’d witnessed two of his potential agents turn on the matt.

”They need some work.” Macklin reported, handing over the paperwork to be lodged in the files. “Need to unlearn some things and relearn some others, but they’ll do. Are you sure they all want to be here?”

Cowley looked up over his glasses. “You have some doubts?”

“Bodie looked like it wasn’t his idea.”

Cowley grunted. “It wasn’t. Things will come to a head eventually with Master Bodie.”

“Doesn’t give much away.”

“Aye.” Cowley shuffled papers. “He’s got a slow fuse. Takes a while to burn, but I don’t doubt that it goes off occasionally. He’ll stay. He’ll push you a bit, but he’ll stay.”

Macklin pursed his lips doubtfully. “If you say so Sir.”

“Anything else?”

Macklin hesitated. “Only other one worth noting was Doyle.”

“Is that right?” Cowley shuffled more papers and waited.

“Not much weight to him. Could be a disadvantage.”

Cowley looked up then. “Danced around you a bit though?”

Macklin nodded and a brief smile touched his lips. He wasn’t surprised that Cowley knew. “Dirty fighter. He’s been on the streets.”

“Aye. I think he’s tough enough.”

“Tough enough, yeah no problems there. But he also pulled his punches, didn’t put his heart into them.”

Cowley considered this. “Could be because technically you are not the enemy.”  
“Could be.” Macklin agreed. “Could be he has a conscience. He’ll aim to wound, not kill, it’s in his nature.”

Cowley paused briefly knowing full well the implications if a CI5 agent hesitated on a killing shot. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

*********************************

At the end of the day he watched through the window as they all separated to their vehicles. Too new yet for friendly drinks, too unsure and probably too bloody sore after an afternoon with Macklin. Tomorrow was weapons, vehicles, bomb squad, then they would be teamed to see how they responded to each other. Twelve weeks of training and he needed them ready and in the field. He was desperately short of manpower. He watched Bodie as he reversed his Lagonda out of his carpark with a squeal of tyres. Bodie could do a runner, but he didn’t think he would. He would be back tomorrow, as would most of them. He watched Doyle’s beat up old car follow. He wasn’t sure about Doyle. He picked up the Detective Constable’s file again and flicked it open, scanning down the records until he found what he was looking for. Syd Parker, killed on duty. Doyle’s partner. Doyle had resisted having partners ever since and had not properly bonded to any he did. He flicked open Bodie’s file. Bodie had always worked in a unit, or on his own, total loyalty or none. Bodie had never had a partner.

It wasn’t an option in this outfit. CI5 worked on a partner basis. An agent had to have a partner to cover his back, their work was far too dangerous not to. He looked from one photo to the other. He looked at the other files. Compatibility when assigning partners was always a difficult thing.

********************************

It was early days, but Cowley’s desperate need for new agents had him observing his current batch at work more than was usual for him. The driving course was laid out, wet and slick in the rain and there were three cars ready and waiting, badly dinged, rusted, but running perfectly under the expertise of the CI5 mechanics. Edwards stood with clipboard in hand and two of his men were already in two of the cars. The third car, a Hillman, sat waiting, a brand new ding in its mudguard courtesy of Anderson who even now stood glowering at it.

“Sloppy Anderson, sloppy, what you been driving then? Your granny’s mini.” Edwards made notes on his clipboard, then turned the page and motioned to Bodie. “In you go sunshine.”

Bodie smirked and walked unhurriedly over to the car.

Cowley watched as he adjusted the seat, turned the ignition and revved the motor. A pleased look appeared on that smooth handsome face, it was apparent that Bodie found the power in the disreputable old car to his liking. Edwards’s drivers were ready in the other cars. Bodie waited, letting the engine idle until Edwards glanced up, to see what the hold up was. Without warning the Hillman shot forward like a stone from a catapult, Bodie changing gears rapidly. On cue the two chase cars followed.

Bodie swung through the witch’s hats and slammed the Hillman into the first tight turn. He shoved in second and spun the wheel and, as he passed the spectators, a boyish grin spread across his face. Cowley was momentarily taken aback, not at the skill behind the wheel, which he had expected, but at that smile - when Bodie had shown not a flicker of emotion on his face for the entire three days he had been here. It took less than ten minutes for Bodie to finish the course accurately, managing to avoid all cardboard pedestrians as well as out drive the two chasing cars. Edwards didn’t comment as he alighted smoothly from the car, brushing fastidiously at his expensive pants and jacket. Bodie walked to the others, carefully adjusting his face back to that bored indifferent expression. He stood beside Joe Tulliver, another ex para, and Tulliver nodded cordially to him.

“Doyle” Edwards said, following the alphabetical list in front of him. Doyle’s trainers casually covered the ground to the car and long denim-clad legs folded themselves into the driver’s position. He didn’t adjust the seat, but did move the mirrors. Edwards was still writing and without warning Doyle shoved in first and dropped the clutch. The tyres squealed and the Hillman shot forward. The chase drivers, taken by surprise hurriedly pulled out after him. Doyle drove with the controlled finesse of the police trained. He more than matched Bodie for wild cornering, avoided the pedestrians without visible effort and kept the Hillman within the witch’s hats. On the last corner, his face a mask of concentration, he swung the Hillman broadside, tyres protesting with angry clouds of blue smoke and brought it to an abrupt halt. The following cars, in an effort to avoid him, crashed either side into the rubber barriers erected to mark the course.

Edwards head shot up from the clipboard at the resultant noise. Cowley’s eyes narrowed at the possible damage bill. The two chase cars stalled and Ray Doyle calmly stepped from the driver’s seat of the Hillman. He made the shape of a gun with fingers and thumb of his right hand. He swung it pointing, from one car to the other, waited for a beat, then unhurriedly inserted himself back into the car and drove back to where Edwards was staring, clipboard forgotten. Doyle alighted from the car and sauntered back to the waiting men. Bodie eyed him speculatively and his lips twitched. Doyle raised a fine brow back and folded his arms across his chest. Edwards, after a hard stare, went back to writing in the clipboard. It didn’t need anyone to point out that not only had Doyle evaded pursuit, but he had also captured his pursuers.

“Harley!” Edwards said, without looking up.

 

***********************

There were a stack of reports on his desk, one for each of his new recruits. Cowley was tired. A long meeting with the Minister, a problem with a stakeout and now he had these reports to finish up. The door opened and his current secretary Betty came in with a tray. Betty was shapely, beautiful and strictly off limits to his oversexed young agents. Which of course, made her all the more desirable to them. “Why haven’t you gone home?” Cowley enquired, but was grateful all the same. There were sandwiches on the tray and he was hungry.

“Knew you’d be burning the midnight oil Sir, just wanted to make sure you had something to eat before I left.”

“Aye, thank you.” She left the office and Cowley pulled the files towards him.

Bert Edwards had been training CI5 agents in defensive driving ever since he had started the organisation. The obstacle course was laid out not far from the weapons training facility and the course was changed with each session. He had marked with ticks, the maneuvers each Agent passed and Cowley read them all. Only three files were accompanied by notations, something Edwards rarely did. It came as no surprise to Cowley which three. Tindle contained a small note that a car was not a tank and that he needed extra work. Bodie’s was a bit more out of character. _Thinks he knows more than I do and he may be right._ And of course the other was Doyle’s. _Drives the course as though it is his neighbourhood. I’m glad I don’t live there._ Cowley snorted with sudden amusement. Edwards had a diabolical sense of humour but his comments confirmed what he had witnessed, there wasn’t much that could be taught about driving to those two.

Weapons reports were also in, covered in Macklin’s neat writing. Cowley had witnessed two training sessions, the rifle and sniper’s course and the handgun target practice. Most of the men had done previous shooting, particularly the military candidates. All had some experience with most of the weapons CI5 used. Only one - that he was aware of - had actually killed with one.

Bodie had sighted the rifle on the distant targets, for once uncharacteristically serious, expression set in earnest lines of concentration. He hadn’t missed a single one. Cowley had already known from his file that Bodie was a long distance expert. He knew that Bodie had gained his experience during his mercenary years. He didn’t know how many men Bodie had killed but he recognised the desensitised way he handled his weapon. He didn’t flinch, looked neither concerned nor blasé, nervous or excited. It was a piece of equipment he evidently respected and he handled it accordingly and with the ease of familiarity.

Tindle was the only other man that came close to Bodie in precision and surprisingly it was Ray Doyle after him. A rifle was not a coppers usual weapon but Doyle had an eye for accuracy. Doyle, however, openly outshone everyone with the handgun. Legs braced apart, knees slightly bent, arms straight, both fists around the gun, he was fast and deadly, every bullet hitting where he intended. Cowley was unsurprised at his skill, Morrison had mentioned it in the initial reports, but he was nevertheless in awe of the sheer ability of Doyle with a 9mm Browning semi auto pistol. Privately of course. The only man that came anywhere near Doyle in ability was Bodie. Bodie who was familiar with just about every weapon currently on and off the market, black or legitimate. But he didn’t quite match Doyle and, by the fleeting expression Cowley caught before Bodie carefully hid his thoughts, wasn’t happy about it either.

 

************************************

The training warehouse was currently empty, the dummy plyboard villains flat against the obstacle course, the make believe streets silent. Cowley stood on the observation deck, arms folded and waited patiently. Three weeks into training and this was the clincher for partner assignment. This would be the deciding test to match them up. Macklin liked to put the stronger agents with weaker ones, to balance it out. It made sense; often a stronger agent could improve his slightly weaker colleague, giving them both a higher chance of survival. The partners had to rely on each other every day, for their lives if necessary, so Macklin also like to match backgrounds. The more compatible they were, the better.

Doyle was first up with Harley. Macklin stood with his loudspeaker and gave the command to start. The doors were kicked open and Doyle and Harley moved in. The first villain popped up and Doyle’s weapon shred its head from its body, multiple rounds discharging in quick succession. Then he was moving on to a second and third without pausing, as seamlessly as though he wasn’t even thinking about it. Cowley watched intently. Despite having already witnessed Doyle’s deadly accuracy with a handgun, it still impressed him.

Harley followed behind Doyle and a pop-up exploded to his left. He spun; finger on the trigger and Cowley distinctly heard Doyle’s warning cry as Harley neatly shot a hole in the leg of a ply wood child. Harley faltered but another pop-up came from behind him simultaneously as two more to Doyle’s left sprang upright. Doyle flattened himself down and neatly put several holes in the target behind the old lady, then two more into the pop-up behind Harley, before ejecting his empty clip and rapidly inserting another. He rolled easily to his feet, tatty jeans covered in dust, trainers kicking aside the debris.

Harley came up beside him, when he should have been ranging out covering Doyle’s back, and Doyle was angry. That temper, it was there all right, flaring up unexpectedly. Cowley privately thought he was justified. He had seen, as Doyle had, that Harley’s move had endangered them both. Cowley settled himself in the hard chair, resigned to a long morning. Plainly there was no rapport between them and Macklin evidently arrived at the same conclusion. He halted the session as Doyle ran a hand distractedly through his curls.

“Good reflexes, bad temper.” Macklin said from behind him lowering the loudspeaker. “Doyle that is. He doesn’t want a partner.”

“He’ll have one whether he likes it or not.” Cowley snapped, privately wondering who in the files would be best to handle that explosive temper, rein it in, use it to their advantage.

“That’s the third copper I’ve tried him with. He’s too edgy, too quick, puts them off, they can’t keep up with him.”

“If Doyle can put them off they’re no good to me.” Cowley said brutally. “Doyle is nothing to what they’ll be facing out there.”

“Then if you can’t partner him, who will you get rid of?” Macklin asked softly. “Four possible agents, or the one that can’t get on with them.”

Cowley was silent. Doyle was too good to lose; he’d already seen that. But he was no good if he couldn’t or wouldn’t follow the rules. He was no good on his own.

“Bodie and Tindle are next.” Macklin consulted his roster.

The training ground was reset, the plywood figures replaced and Macklin again lifted the loudspeaker. This time the door opened and Bodie crept in, silent and lethal. Tindle came after him. Bodie gestured to one side and Tindle immediately ranged out. Both military, the hand signals weren’t a problem. The rapport was though. Bodie clearly worked on his own, leaving his training partner behind as he systematically shredded villains. Then he belatedly realised that Tindle wasn’t with him and glanced back. Tindle had no idea where Bodie had gone. Bodie cat footed back, and his usual deadpan face showed a flicker of exasperation at Tindle for being unable to predict what he was doing.

“Och what’s Tindle doing, any fool could see what Bodie was planning. All he had to do was drop and cover…” Cowley trailed off as implications spun in his head. He had visualised what Bodie had been doing and had seen something else in the positioning of the two men. Something that had echoed the previous team. If that had been Doyle instead of Tindle, then Bodie would have kept his partner’s back in sight, and Doyle would have been in line with Bodie, moving on the same track, the same thought.

“Stop.” Macklin said over the loudspeaker.

Cowley sat thoughtfully as the training ground was yet again reset. Could it work? He opened the files again and looked at the two photographs. You couldn’t get two men more different if you’d tried. Chalk and cheese. Could it work? He remembered the initial conversations with Banks and Morrison. He doesn’t care much about anything. He cares. Too much. Well, why not.

“Wait.” He said to Macklin, as he was about to call in the next team. “What do you get if you cross Nitro and Glycerin?”

Puzzled Macklin said: “A big bang sir.”

“Exactly man. Have you paired Doyle and Bodie yet? For any exercise?”

Macklin shook his head. “No. I mean, their backgrounds. Doyle’s a copper, Bodie’s military. It’d never work, they’re too different.”

“Aye, but think. If it could work, their strengths and weaknesses are almost the opposite of each other. If they paired, the strengths would cancel out the weaknesses. Bodie’s cool against Doyle’s temper. Doyle’s care factor with Bodie’s indifference. If it worked, they would be a team to be reckoned with.”  
Macklin looked doubtful. “Can’t see it working. They’ll end up killing each other.”

“Maybe. If so, the problem of partnering them will no longer exist.” Cowley looked smug. “Pair them up and send them in.”

If Macklin thought his boss was nuts he didn’t say so. Instead he beckoned for an assistant and sent him down to relay the instructions.

This time when the signal was sent and the doors opened, Bodie and Doyle came in and began the course. It wasn’t perfect, they didn’t know each other at all, but it was a vast improvement on the previous two attempts. Without any sort of prompting or communication, Doyle went low, while Bodie covered him, Doyle spun backwards to cover the rear when Bodie went ahead. It was almost as if they could second-guess the other.

Macklin gave a low whistle. “Different style, different reflexes, different thinking. There’s no way that should work.”

“I think,” said George Cowley, smugly pleased with himself. “That you have got your first team Macklin.”

*********************************  
 **Chapter 3**

They stood in front of his desk now, as unalike as ever. They were much the same height, much the same age, but similarity stopped there. Doyle stood at ease in his scruffy jeans and T-shirt, hair in disarray, face clearly unhappy at the news. Bodie stood straight, clothes tastefully fitted, dark eyes fixed at a point somewhere above Cowley’s left shoulder, smooth face inscrutable.

“Sir, if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather work solo.” Doyle began, not looking at his new partner.

“But it’s not the same to me Doyle.” Cowley reproved mildly enough. “There is no choice here. CI5 Agents have a partner whether they like it or not. You need someone to watch your back, that’s what your partner does. The work you will do is too dangerous not to have one.”

“Yeah..but…” Doyle began and Cowley fixed him with a gimlet eye.

Oh he’d known Doyle would argue, knew he’d have run-ins with the lad, the file had warned him so. Knew he’d be questioned, when he was unused to being questioned by a subordinate. Glaring at the boy, he placed both palms on the desk, became stern. Doyle’s expressive eyes were rebellious, mutinous, not backing down despite the fact that he was arguing with the chief of CI5 and not merely the senior sergeant of a local police station.

But Cowley also valued an inquisitive mind and Doyle had that in bucket loads. That, coupled with his coppers nose for criminal activity and his strong desire for justice would no doubt get him in serious trouble one day if he wasn’t careful. Cowley briefly considered Bodie’s ability to keep his headstrong new partner out of danger. Bodie had no loyalty to Doyle as yet, no loyalty to CI5 for that matter, coerced as he was into joining, but Cowley was sure that Bodie was capable of it, his SAS background had trained him that way. And Bodie also had a knack for self-preservation that might balance out Doyle’s impetuous nature. Cowley had hopes that one day they might even rub their individual traits and talents onto each other. But right now Bodie wasn’t the problem.

“What is it that has you so opposed to this pairing Doyle?”

Doyle hesitated, glancing at the silent man beside him. Bodie relaxed slightly and answered for him. “It’s me Sir.”

Doyle wasn’t embarrassed, in fact his face changed from truculent to agreement in a single heartbeat. “Well yeah, I’m not sure that it’d work. That we would work. Sir.”

Bodie threw him a sneer, lip curling with dislike. “He means that our backgrounds are too different. After all, he was only a copper.”

Doyle’s eyes flashed blue. “And he’s been up a tree with monkeys for years.”

“That’s enough.” Cowley stood up, heading off Doyle’s explosive temper before it gained momentum. “I give the orders here and you do as I say or you’re out. Go and find a pub and sort out whatever it is that is between you, because you are on active duty in a months time and if you can’t trust and rely on each other by then, I’ll be ordering headstones. Now get out and come back when you’re agreeable or don’t come back at all.”

*************************************

The local pub was fortunately within walking distance. Both men were silent as they easily and lithely walked along the footpath, Bodie smooth and handsome in a tailored jacket and expensive trousers, Doyle scruffily appealing in casual jeans and a bomber jacket. Late afternoon threw blue toned shadows across the pavement and leaves dropped steadily in swirling patterns of red and gold.

The pub wasn’t busy; there were barely a handful of drinkers, mostly clustered around the football match on the telly at the far end of the bar. Bodie gave a sigh and settled himself on a stool, out of earshot of the other patrons. Well wasn’t this just perfect. Paired with the skinny hotheaded copper, the one he thought he’d never have anything to do with.

Inconceivably and irrevocably partners.

What on earth had given Cowley the notion to even suggest that they could make a good team, they’d barely done anything together, until today. And when the assistant had come to tell them that they were to attempt the course together, Doyle had looked as confused as Bodie had felt, and about as happy about it too.

Bodie had thought that he had demonstrated quite ably that he was better on his own. Even in the army, he’d felt the weight of the Unit he was forced to work with, as weak as the weakest man. Cowley must be barking. Doyle? Although to tell the truth, he’d been surprised at the intuitive ability of the copper during the mornings training course. He’d seemed to know what Bodie was doing, and what he needed to do in return, positioning himself appropriately. But still… He shot a covert look at said new partner.

Doyle didn’t look particularly friendly, just waited in that still fashion of his, arms folded, defensive, as though waiting to see what Bodie would do now. Bodie regarded him briefly before turning back to the bar. How to figure him? He was a contradiction, either all nervous, fidgety energy or that utter stillness. Like now. Made him unpredictable to say the least.

It wasn’t his physical ability, not by a long shot. Bodie had been as surprised as the rest of them when Doyle, slippery as a fish after bait, and about as elusive, dodged around Macklin on that first day. Bodie had very nearly laughed out loud. That’d teach Macklin to judge a book by its cover. By the time Doyle was on the mat, Bodie had grudgingly conceded that the Detective-Constable could hold his own, size or not. That scrappy way of fighting was underhanded but remarkably effective.

And shoot, the Golly could certainly shoot. Better than Bodie with a handgun, and Bodie wasn’t adverse to admitting it, although he wouldn’t admit it to Doyle. He was fast and accurate, with an odd, enviable ability to draw his weapon with equal speed and dexterity using either hand, although he was right handed. Bodie had never seen that before. Doyle could get his gun out his holster faster with his left hand, than Tindle could with his right and he was just as steady pointing it. His driving was good too. Bodie in all honesty couldn’t say who was the better there. Doyle drove fast and controlled, police trained, whereas Bodie drove on instinct.

No it wasn’t any physical ability, it was more that they didn’t really gel, had nothing in common. And Cowley wanted to partner them? Barking. He gave a short snort, another sigh and then a resigned shrug. Bodie wasn’t a habitual brooder. You did what you could with what you had and got on with it. Made the best of a bad situation. No self-recriminations, no guilt. If Cowley wanted them to be partners…well, it was better than working the laundry tubs in the nick and that’s where he’d end up. Maybe he could cool the hothead down a bit, see what made him tick. The more Bodie thought about it, the more he realised that having Ray Doyle’s physical ability in a spot of bother might just be preferable to Tindle, even if they did kill each other afterwards.

The barmaid came over and he gave her a charming smile. “Lager thanks love.”  
He glanced over his shoulder, seeing the mutinous expression still on Doyle’s face, those wide expressive eyes still flashing sparks of blue, and raised a brow. Bodie wasn’t fazed by Doyle’s temper, he’d seen Doyle try to rein it in and succeed more often than not. And to his credit he was just as quick to calm down, as he was to flare up.

“What’ll you have sunshine?”

Doyle didn’t answer for a minute, glaring at the crowd in the corner, then, as the barmaid waited expectantly, he sucked in his breath, rolled his shoulders and looked askance at Bodie. “You buying?”

Bodie eyes crinkled minutely. “I’m buying.”

Doyle nodded. “Scotch. Thanks.”

“Don’t know about you mate,” Bodie said as the barmaid left to fill the order. “But I think maybe we should start again.”

He picked two coasters out of the pile on the bar and deliberately set them down in front of them. “You sweat it out and you pour it back. Stay Cool.” He turned to face Doyle and gravely nodded as though meeting him for the first time. “Bodie.”

Doyle stared at him, at that smooth handsome face that gave nothing away, the midnight blue eyes, now looking intently at him and shrugged, anger dissipating. Why not? They’d have to work together whether they liked it or not and he didn’t like it but short of leaving CI5 - and he definitely didn’t want to do that - he’d have to accept it. Though he thought Cowley was a sandwich short of a picnic to even suggest pairing them. “Doyle.”

Bodie smiled encouragingly and Doyle tilted his head studying him. It was the most emotion he’d seen on Bodie’s mug in the whole time they’d been training. Even now, flirting with the barmaid, a charming smile on his face, nothing was revealed to Doyle about the man beneath the cool calm exterior and Bodie himself certainly hadn’t volunteered any information, unless you counted those tall stories in the rest room, the ones that always seemed to involve Africa, a lot of danger and scantily clad women. He didn’t seem to care about anything, or at least if he did, he didn’t show it.

Doyle watched him curiously, his mind clicking over at its usual swift pace. Maybe that was it. Maybe Bodie had learned to school his face, keep his thoughts hidden. If he’d been fighting jungle warfare, then Doyle couldn’t blame him. He was cool and focused with everything he did, on the weapons range, in the cars, on the mat. His skillful driving was clearly apparent, as was his ability with a rifle, better than him anyway, though Doyle beat everyone with the handgun. And he gave Macklin a run for his money, sheer power and sharp reflexes honed to perfection from his mercenary past.

Cowley sending an assistant down to pair them up had caused a flutter of unease deep in Doyle’s belly. Bodie hadn’t shown any sort of reaction but Doyle would bet his best shirt – which, on a coppers wage, was hardly worth wagering – that Bodie hadn’t liked it either. Doyle had immediately sensed why they were being paired for the first time and he’d wanted to refuse outright. He didn’t want a partner and so far had managed to stay incompatible to his fellow police officers in an attempt to stay solo.

But Bodie? They had never even held a conversation in the restroom, Bodie would regale the army blokes with tall tales of his past and Doyle would swap opinions on case files with the Police candidates.

His initial alarm at their possible pairing was briefly allayed by the simple fact that if he was incompatible to men from the Met, then surely he and Bodie couldn’t, wouldn’t be able to click. They were nothing alike. It was nothing to do with his physical ability, which Doyle grudgingly admitted was impressive. It was simply the compatibility. Doyle had a brief memory of Syd Parker and firmly locked it away. No, this test would show Cowley his mistake for even remotely considering pairing them. He was woefully wrong.

Usually very observant, Doyle hadn’t liked that Cowley had seen something about Bodie that he hadn’t - enough to consider testing them as a team. He’d liked even less that, once inside, Bodie was able to anticipate his every move, faultlessly providing the back up Doyle had needed for each of his maneuvers and at the same time able to make aggressive moves on his own without exposing either of them to danger. His reflexes were astounding. Doyle thought of Harley and acknowledged - no matter how reluctantly - that he’d prefer Bodie in a tight situation, even if they came to blows afterwards.

The drinks came and Bodie picked his up with a suggestive smile aimed at the barmaid before turning back to Doyle. “That's the main thing, staying cool. Saw my medical report: slow heartbeat, slow metabolism. Gotta be cool. Sneaked a look at yours, though. Very uncool. Hot temperament.”

Doyle’s finely drawn brows shot up in disbelief and his voice came out heavy with skepticism. “When would you have seen my medical report?”

Bodie smirked reminiscently. “When the nurse was getting dressed.”

Doyle snorted dismissively and picked up his drink.

Bodie was privately amused at Doyle’s reaction. He decided to try some charm on this prickly partner of his. After all it had worked on the nurse.

“Still, a good man. The tops. Worth knowing. You won't fall if they push."

Doyle had taken a sip of his scotch and nearly choked on that comment. Very deliberately he replaced the glass on the supplied coaster and turned to again face his new partner. The poor light from the bar cast his face into shadows, highlighting the bump of his damaged cheekbone. He saw Bodie’s gaze flick to it and then those midnight eyes swung back to his. Doyle waited, giving him the opening but Bodie didn’t ask how the damage had occurred. He was plainly waiting for a response to that ludicrous statement.

Doyle thought he just might be starting to make sense of this complex man. The smirk remained giving Bodie a rather boyish look, like a kid with a slingshot behind his back. Bodie was winding him up. Doyle’s face relaxed, allowing his natural impish expression to replace the hostility, and that almost smile hovered around his mouth. The damaged cheekbone didn’t detract from Doyle’s ability to pull birds by the dozen - when he wanted to – proven by the passing barmaid who paused to cast him an appreciative double look, quick to acknowledge that a lean hard body went with that mischievously attractive face.

Doyle barely noticed, his attention was solely on his smirking partner. He’d dealt with all sorts of people from all walks of life. He knew how to give it back. _You won’t fall if they push._

“Course I won’t.” said Ray Doyle.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 4

 

The ground was littered with spent cartridges, the targets were mere tatters of plywood and Macklin was thoroughly fed up. Doyle and Bodie stood at the end of the course; guns empty, adrenaline still high, running like quicksilver through their veins.

Competing, Macklin thought sourly. Like schoolboys in a schoolyard popularity scrap. They weren’t working together for God’s Sake. They were trying to outdo each other. All week they’d been sniping and growling and getting up each others noses and Macklin was ready to knock the pair of their heads together. He knew what the problem was. Cowley knew what the problem was, and sure as hell the other agents did as well.

They were each the top of their field. To have someone else better at something brought out their competitive natures and neither would concede to the other. Bodie had practiced more with his handgun over the last week than in the entire first month. And Doyle had been doing sniper training in an attempt to increase his prowess with the weapon. Well it was going to stop. Macklin decided that it was time they learned and acknowledged the strengths and weaknesses of each other before they got their thick heads blown off in their first assignment.

Bodie’s face showed a brief flicker of disgust as he spun the chamber of his Smith and Wesson revolver and dug in his jacket pocket for fresh shells. Doyle, the handgun expert, smirked in satisfaction as he also rummaged in his jeans back pocket for a fresh clip for his 9 mm semi auto.

“That’s enough” Macklin snarled from behind them and they turned simultaneously to face his wrath. “You are supposed to be working together. It’s not a game; it’s not to see who is the best. There are no prizes for coming first and there is definitely no prize for second place. Second place is dead. Go and do it again and this time work together.”

He stalked off, muttering under his breath about ridiculous pairings of cocky young egotistical idiots. Bodie closed his eyes in resignation. Doyle caught his lower lip between his teeth, tilted his head at Bodie then spun on one heel to follow the CI5 trainer. Macklin was ahead of them, talking to one of his assistants, a powerful hard man with the unlikely name of Reg Buttons.

He gestured and pointed to the course. Buttons nodded and walked over to the armoury cart. He reached in and selected a weapon, spun the chamber and hefted it in his fist. Suddenly not liking this, Doyle and Bodie cautiously approached the start of the course.

“Something has to get through to you both.” Macklin said, still in a fury. “Buttons here is the target, he’s armed. You are to apprehend him with no loss or casualty to innocent bystanders. Oh and here’s the catch. He has live rounds.”

Disbelief shone on both their faces.

“You can’t do that.” Doyle said aghast. “There’s regulations with live rounds you know.”

“You still don’t get it do you?” Macklin said, anger not abating one bit. “In four weeks you’ll be out there facing live rounds. Men who are professionals, deadly, more experienced than the pair of you. Who won’t give a toss whether they blow you or anyone else in the vicinity to kingdom come. The way you two are acting it’s highly likely one or both of you will be pushing up daises on the first day. Now or then it’s still going to happen. And what regulations Doyle? You left the force, you are no longer a copper therefore you do not have to abide by regulations.”

“Do we get live rounds?” Bodie asked as he spun the chamber of his gun. He didn’t look concerned, but then again, Doyle thought irritably, he never did.

“No, the paint rounds.”

“Well that’s not fair.” Bodie said frowning, giving Doyle vicious satisfaction that something at last had riled his cool partner.

“Neither is life.” Macklin snapped. He turned and nodded to Buttons and the man slipped through the doors and disappeared into the set. Macklin took their weapons and emptied the rounds, tidily replacing the handguns on the armoury cart. Doyle stood hands on hips, face tight as he watched Macklin select the paint guns. Bodie’s face was made of granite as Macklin handed him the special paint load gun along with a handful of extra rounds.

“Right.” Macklin said brutally and shoved open the door. “Try and come back alive.”

“Yeah,” Doyle couldn’t help a parting shot. “And you can explain it to my date tonight if I don’t.”

“A date?” Bodie, incredulous, had to ask. “When have you had time to find a date?”

Doyle shrugged and carefully peered around the door. “She asked me when we were leaving the pub last week.”

“You mean that barmaid, the one at the Ten Bells?” Bodie scowled.

Doyle turned that curly head of his and smiled a smile that only an Angel could produce. Then he slipped through the door.

This time there was a distinct change in the way they interacted. The air crackled with tension. Doyle glanced at Bodie as he stepped inside and flattened himself against the wall. Bodie, tearing his thoughts away from the pretty barmaid, met his gaze and coolly nodded to the left. Doyle crouched and went low to the first stack of crates. Bodie waited until he was set and covering him, then he silently moved to the right. The first shot splintered into the wood by Bodies foot and he swore, diving to the ground. Doyle was up in an instant, legs braced, fists around the butt of the bulky paint gun. He fired 3 rounds at the window where Buttons was crouching. Buttons pitched sideways and blue paint pellets splattered the window frame. Doyle was about to shoot again when the plywood figure of a little girl carrying a dog popped up in a direct path between his gun and Buttons. Doyle swore and dropped back behind cover.

Bodie threw him a furious look but Doyle ignored him. He dodged around his crate and hared across to the next concealment. Bullets followed, nipping at his heels, but Ray Doyle was nothing if not fast and he dived headlong behind the partition of a shop front. Bodie had gained safety during his mad dash and was now up and firing. Buttons had stopped beside the plyboard cut outs of a young couple pushing a pram. Bodie disregarded the innocents and sent a furious barrage in Buttons direction. Buttons dodged away, and two bright blue pellets struck the edge of the pram. Doyle yelped in outrage and started forward again until he was level with his partner.

“You nicked the pram.” Doyle yelled, temper igniting.

Bodie glanced up at him. “If you had of got him before, I wouldn’t nicked the pram would I? It’d be finished.”

“Got him? I couldn’t have got him. What about the kid with the dog?”

“What about them, you telling me you couldn’t have hit him around the kid? Come on Doyle who are you kidding? You don’t miss anything you aim at.”

“This isn’t target practice Bodie. I don’t take risks. Not like that, and not at children for god’s sake. Not at a pram.”

“I wouldn’t have hit the kid, it was too low.”

“What?” Doyle, forgetting himself, began to stand. A bullet whistled past his head, and swearing, he dropped down again, curls bouncing around his neck. “What do you mean you wouldn’t have hit the kid? You don’t know that. What about the parents?”

Bodie looked impatient, cut him off. “Well what do you think they’d rather? A hole in their pram or a nutter taking them for hostage.”

“You don’t know that he would.” Doyle argued.

“You don’t know that he wouldn’t.” Bodie shot back. “Look, when you have a killing shot, you go for it no matter what.”

“You try and take them alive.” Doyle snarled at his partner. “If you shoot to kill, you’re the same as him.”

Bodie swiftly turned and regarded Doyle. Registered the anger, the outrage and the reason came through loud and clear. “You’ve never killed?”

Doyle closed his mouth and didn’t answer. Bodie shook his head. “And what if he’s got a gun on me Doyle? What then, you gonna let him have me so you won’t be the same as him?”

Doyle went white, then gestured furiously to the plywood child and dog. “You’ve got to draw the line somewhere Bodie. Or did you enjoy it, killing people?”

Bodie’s slow fuse began to burn. That slow fuse that Cowley had said would go off in spectacular style one day. “No I didn’t enjoy it. What about you then, how many crims have you let go, so they can kill and maim again and again because you didn’t have the guts to finish them.”

Bodie had forgotten Doyle’s speed. Doyle was out of his hiding place in a flash, fist connecting with Bodie’s jaw, before Bodie had barely finished his sentence. Bodie’s jaw was up to plenty of punishment. His own fist came around in retaliation but Doyle dodged away, lightning fast, caught the fist and wrenched it away, off balancing his partner, and Bodie’s slow fuse ignited. He went after Doyle, ears roaring. Doyle’s anger was reciprocated, and then they were both at it hammer and tongs.

Buttons stood in the make believe street, gun in hand and watched, shaking his head. Macklin appeared in the doorway hands on hips, observing, making no attempt to break it up. In his opinion they both needed it. No better way to get to know someone than to knock the stuffing out of him. Maybe he’d get them doing what they needed to do now. Having seen them working together, he agreed with Cowley with the pairing they’d make. If they ever got past the need to fly solo that is. Maybe this would do it.

***********************

It was much later; sitting in the darkening rest room that Macklin put a bottle of scotch and two glasses on the table in front of them. “For medicinal purposes.” He said and paused. He’d patched them up as best as he could, applied ice and plasters and antiseptic cream, but the whiskey would do the most good. “You’d be a good team you know. If only you’d both accept being a team.”

The silence stretched after he left. Bodie gave a small sigh and closed his one good eye, leaning heavily into the ice pack against the other. If Doyle could pull a gun from a holster with a swift and sure left hand, it would stand to reason that he could use the same left hand to hit and pummel with equal force and accuracy, and he certainly had. Being ambidextrous had its advantages and Bodie could feel every one of them, imprinted as a bruise on his skin. He may not have any weight but Doyle packed a hard punch.

He thought about his complicated partner as he took a sip of straight scotch, the raw alcohol stinging the inside of his mouth where his teeth had bitten the lining. Bodie couldn’t believe that Doyle had hesitated on a shot that would have been as sure and easy for someone of his ability as standing alone in front of an elephant size target. Doyle never missed. But apparently, his conscience couldn’t or wouldn’t take the risk. With an unaccustomed insight, Bodie came to the conclusion that Doyle wouldn’t be able to live with the consequences if he missed in a real situation and hit a hostage. That and his damned copper background. Protect the innocent and all that stuff. He was complex and idealistic and he had morals that Bodie had long ago abandoned.

Bodie wondered briefly on Doyle’s career, he’d walked some of the meanest streets in London when he was a fresh-faced new recruit. He’d dealt with the corrupt and seedy side of humanity on the drug squad. The Yard had exposed him to horrendous homicides. So Harley had told him. And yet in spite of all that, all that he had seen and been exposed to, Doyle had managed to keep that small bit of humanity intact within himself, unspoiled by the cesspool of life around him. A remote honest part of Bodie almost envied it. He took another sip and opened his eyes to look at his partner. Partner. Cowley had drummed it into both of them that a partner watched his back. What if Doyle wasn’t up to it?

Doyle held his own glass against his throbbing temple, expressive eyes closed, smudges under them. His tongue came out frequently to touch at the split in his bottom lip. Wincing against the sting of scotch in that cut, Doyle wondered if he would ever accept Bodie’s view on the world. How could anyone have so little regard for life that it justified the risks Bodie was prepared to take. If they couldn’t get a common ground then Bodie wouldn’t be watching his back. Bodie would be working solo to his own agenda. And Doyle wouldn’t be able to rely on him.

So he’d killed. Killed in a stinking jungle in a war that had nothing to do with Britain, or any of her subjects. Killed frequently too if he could shut it all out and not give a damn. Doyle had no idea how much was true in Bodie’s tales, which got more lurid and outrageous every time he told them. But Bodie had also spent time in Belfast and a stint there would shatter anyone’s beliefs in the good of mankind. Doyle could see why Bodie had that ruthlessness. Why he could shut off the emotional side of what he did. But there had to be some point at drawing the line. He’d known that line in the Met. Knew how far he could go and still stay on the right side of it. Within the law.

But his last three months in the Met hadn’t been good. That line had become blurred in London’s finest. Where a good copper was torn between turning a blind eye to wrongdoing and speaking out against it. Preston and Montgomery… that hadn’t gone down well. Yet he still wouldn’t have done it differently. It would have gone against everything he believed in, to do nothing and allow it to continue.

Though he’d been glad to be given the chance to get out. And to CI5 too, top of the tree, the Big A, higher than all of them. He recalled Cowley’s words on that first day. Using a criminal tactics against him. Do unto him first what he is only thinking about.

It was different now and the line was blurred, unclear.

“Can't afford to give a damn.” Bodie’s voice startled him and he jerked his eyes open. Bodie took another sip of scotch, his midnight blue gaze penetrating. “Might make you hesitate. Forget the book. You shoot to kill. He will.”

Doyle had the most uncomfortable sensation, as though Bodie had read his mind. There was silence again, both men reflective.

“It’s madness.” Doyle said at last and swallowed another mouthful, eyes crinkling at the smarting in his lip.

“Yeah.” Bodie surprisingly agreed with him. “But there’s only us to stop it. Stop it getting out of control.” He paused and tilted his glass. The amber liquid gleamed in the faint light from the window. “It’s what we do.”

Doyle looked up and Bodie grinned at him, before setting the glass back down.  
“Well come on pardner.” He drawled in a passable Texan accent. “Time to mosey on out of here.”

“Yeah.” Doyle stood up gingerly, favouring his ribs with his left hand. He thought of the rules of the Met, he thought of the snouts and the grasses, the bribery and corruption within the force and what the bent ones got away with. CI5 was above all that all right. Maybe fighting fire with fire was the answer. Bodie watched him critically as he maneuvered around the table.

They walked slowly and stiffly out of the room and to the lift both thinking of a hot shower and a warm bed. Bodie pressed the button and the doors opened.

“So..” said Bodie casually. “This date of yours.”

“Yeah?”

“Well if you’re not up to it, I can let her know. Least I can do for a partner.”

“Didn’t say I wasn’t up to it. That part is working perfectly. Besides, with that eye, you’d scare her off.”

The lift doors closed.

***************************  
 **Chapter 5**

 

 

Cowley wanted to see them first thing in the morning and his face, lined, hard and unforgiving didn’t bode well.

They stood in front of him; much as they had on the day he had informed them that they were to be partners albeit a little worse for wear. Looking at them, Cowley was astonished at the amount of damage they’d inflicted upon each other and was savagely pleased they were hurting. All in all it was probably a better punishment than he could have dished out. Dished out and still had able operatives that is. And this way they knew the mettle of the other, knew what the other was capable of and hopefully absorbed some of the others traits.

“Weel. I see that you are still fighting my decision.” His Scots became more pronounced when he was angry and he was in full swing. Doyle and Bodie glanced briefly at each other in an unexpected show of unity. Cowley, shrewd and sharp saw it. He saw it and his frustration with them eased. Just a fraction. They still needed a barracking and he still needed to give it. He leaned back, maintaining his aggressive stance. “Do ye not see, either of you, that one day the man beside you will save your life?”

Bodie’s face didn’t betray a thing, closing up as Bodie could do so well, but Doyle flinched. Very slightly, undetectable to anyone else but not to Cowley. He knew what the problem was.

“Macklin says that there is no point in any more training. That you both insist on competing rather than working together. So I’ll take the choice away from you. As of today you are both on active duty. A surveillance job at the south London docks. We had a tip off about gun running happening there. I want to know what is going on. I want to know how big it is. I want to know when and where it is happening. Observation only, no contact and absolutely no shooting. There are to be several drop offs according to the snout and I want to know every detail before we move in. Your job is to see how much muscle they have.”

He paused to observe their reactions. Bodie didn’t change expression. Doyle frowned as if hearing something that he didn’t like, but uncharacteristically didn’t argue. Grimly satisfied, he walked to the desk and picked up two small wallets. He threw them, one each. Quicksilver reflexes had both agents snatching them out of the air.

“ID cards” Cowley said, limping around the desk. “Showing your authority. There is no rank in CI5 but as CI5 agents you answer only to me, nobody else, no matter what their rank or position. Go down to the armoury and get yourselves outfitted. Call signs have been allocated to you. Yours, Bodie is 3.7, Doyle’s is 4.5. Use them for radio communication and stay in contact at all times. Get a car from the motor pool and get down to that wharf. Find a place to conceal yourselves; I want you well hidden before dark. You’d better spend the rest of this morning getting in some supplies, you have a long night ahead of you.”

He sat at the desk and pulled a file from his endless pile of paperwork. “Stakeout those docks and find out what is happening. No contact, I want them observed only.”

“What if they shoot at us?” Bodie wanted to know.

“If you are following orders they won’t know you’re there to shoot at you Bodie. We already have a good idea who they are, we don’t need guns blazing, just information.”

“Yes Sir.” The partners turned to leave but Cowley looked up. “Doyle a minute before you go.”

Bodie glanced curiously at Doyle, noting his partner’s baffled expression.

Cowley glared at him as he hesitated. “Wait outside Bodie.” Bodie obediently turned and left, closing the door behind him.

“Sit down Doyle,” Cowley gestured irritably to a chair and Doyle warily dropped into it, hiding the stab of pain in his side as he did so. Cowley looked up at the small exhalation and gazed astutely at him, glasses in one hand, paperwork in the other.

“I’ve been going over your file.” He lifted a page in his hand and waved it. “Police career good. Quite a few run-ins with your superiors.”

Doyle interrupted defensively. “There were reasons.”

“Good reasons, no doubt. You care. The issues in this trade are complex. Tangled. Compassion can be a big step towards solving them.”

Doyle felt provoked enough to say: “Noble sentiments. I hope I live up to them.”

Cowley ignored the remark. “From the day I assigned you and Bodie as a team you’ve fought it. I’ve said before that we don’t operate that way.”

“But Tommy McKay..” Doyle started and Cowley cut him off, briefly wondering if Doyle arguing was destined to be an ongoing ordeal at every meeting.

“Tommy McKay has had three partners killed while working for this organisation. It wouldn’t be a kindness to him or anyone else to add to it. He works in a different capacity for CI5 than what your job will be. I see a good team with you and Bodie, I would rather not lose it, but the choice is now yours. You either start doing your job, under my rules, or you go back to the force.”

Doyle’s eyes flicked up, blue sparks shooting at Cowley, anger brewing. “Bodie doesn’t want…”

“Bodie doesn’t have a choice. You do.” Cowley voice was like ice, conveying in no uncertain terms that he didn’t like being questioned.

Doyle stared at him baffled. How could Bodie not have a choice?

“I know about Syd Parker.” Cowley said then in a quieter tone watching his young operative carefully but Doyle’s face, for once was quite unreadable, still as marble, those wide eyes that would have told Cowley what he was feeling angled down, hidden. “You blame yourself.”

“I should have gone with him.”

“You can’t blame yourself for every thing that goes wrong laddie. What happened to Syd Parker was entirely ill luck. You couldn’t have foreseen it, there is no guarantee you could have prevented it, you were unarmed and had you tried you would have been laid out on the slab next to him. He was doing his job. You were doing yours. You were obeying orders”

The tousled head came up, eyes defiant, the long muscles in his throat working as Doyle swallowed down his bitterness. “Then it doesn’t give me much incentive to obey orders does it? Sir.”

Cowley saw past the defiance. Saw the anguish, the hurt even after all this time. He sympathised with Doyle but didn’t give an inch. He couldn’t afford to.  
“You’ll obey my orders whether you like them or not.”

“Yeah but Bodie..”

“Bodie is a different kettle of fish to Syd Parker. You’ll find that out. Oh you’ll get up each other’s noses, you already have.” He indicated Doyle’s split lip with his glasses. “I can’t see that changing. You’ll get up my nose too. But you have good instincts Doyle. And they are too valuable to be wasted in the Met. You can make a difference here. If you want to.”

Bodie was waiting outside; face again a study of boredom. Overnight his eye had spectacularly bruised and he gave Doyle a questioning look as he came out, seeing the mutinous expression back on his partners face. Doyle tilted his head, his finely drawn brows rising slightly, indicating he didn’t want to talk about it. Bodie gazed at him intently, gave a slight shrug of acceptance and fell in beside him as they both left.

Cowley saw all this from his desk through the open door. Witnessed that silent communication and George Cowley actually smiled. Well then, it seemed his two truculent agents were already mind guessing each other, even if they didn’t yet realise it. Pleased he turned back to his paperwork.

Betty arrived thirty minutes later, for which Cowley was both relieved and thankful. He did not trust the majority of his agents around his very attractive secretary and, from what he had seen and heard, he had even more reason not to trust the two he had just dismissed from his office. As yet, they hadn’t had anything to do with the administrative staff, including Betty and Cowley’s protective streak for his female employees preferred to delay the inevitable as long as he could. They were competitive enough on the field; God knew how competitive they would become for the attentions of the delectable Betty.

She brought in a schedule as he put away the last report. Cowley took it with a murmured thanks. He scanned it and smiled. The Bisto Kids were about to learn a lot more about each other. If they couldn’t or wouldn’t bond properly in structured training, then they would get a crash course out in the field.

“Send 2.6 and 1.9 to me.” He instructed her and she nodded leaving the office with a swish of skirt and shapely bottom.

***********************

“Cowley says no shooting.” Alfred Cole reiterated as he took weapons and ammunition from the shelves and pulled the logbook towards him.

“Then you’d better give us cap guns.” Doyle remarked acidly. At his partner’s tone, Bodie looked up from the handgun in his hands, and his eyes twinkled. Doyle was disgruntled, not that he could blame him. “Or better yet water pistols.”

“Very droll” Cole handed Doyle his choice - a Browning Hi Power automatic. Like Macklin he had dealt with his fair share of cocky new and not so new agents and had long ago learned to ignore the banter with which they kept sanity in their lives. “Just don’t drop it. You look after it and it’ll look after you.”

“Thanks.” Doyle shoved in a fresh clip and took the box of ammo. Bodie picked up his shoulder holster and they both signed the equipment out. The radio transmitters added extra bulk to their jackets.

“Need a rucksack with all this clobber.” Bodie complained, trying to jam all the boxes into his pockets.

“Maybe a handbag would suit you?”

Bodie gave his partner an austere look. “Wouldn’t go with my shoes.”

“Can hide them in the car.” Doyle said with the voice of experience. “Always kept spare stuff in the car at the Yard.”

Bodie eyed him sullenly. “And if they get nicked?”

Doyle shrugged. “Then I suppose it comes out of your wages.”

“Reassuring.” Bodie sniffed disdainfully and glanced up and down the corridor. “Surveillance.” Disgust was ripe in his voice.

“Surveillance” Doyle’s voice was no less disgusted.

“All night.”

“Yeah.” Doyle slung his holster over one shoulder as he checked his R/T. He was frowning as he shoved it into his jacket pocket.

Bodie waited patiently almost visualising Doyle’s mind ticking over, pinpointing what was bothering him and locking on to it like a dog with a bone.

“This doesn’t make sense.” Doyle said finally, almost to himself.

“You” said Bodie succinctly “don’t have to convince me.”

Doyle lost his stillness again. Fidgeting and edgy, he paced backwards and forwards with enough energy to light up the corridor.

“Why send us out to just watch. Why not nail them?”

“He wants to know who they’re meeting.” Bodie said flatly, not particularly interested in the why. An order was an order. If Cowley wanted them to just watch, who was he to argue? He may have to do the job, but it didn’t mean he had to improvise. Or like it. Doyle obviously didn’t see it that way though, that spark of morality would ensure he went beyond the call of duty. And no doubt he’d drag Bodie along with him whether Bodie liked it or not. Bodie felt a brief spurt of indignation at the injustice of it. None of this was his choice.

“But we could still nail them, the runners and the buyers.” He looked up at Bodie speculatively. “You know weapons, you know the black market.”

“Not here and that was years ago.” Bodie protested, not liking the look the ex Detective Constable was wearing. “In Africa…”

“But you would know someone here.” Doyle pressed, stopping that edgy pacing to become utterly still again, staring at his partner. “Someone who supplies?”

Bodie shifted, recognising Doyle’s about turn in tactics and his face expertly closed down. Doyle wasn’t fooled. Bodie could school his face whenever he didn’t want anyone probing his thoughts, but just doing so showed that he had something to hide.

“Well if you’d rather sit on a freezing dock all night long, that’s up to you mate.” Doyle said and made off down the corridor at a fast pace. Bodie frowned after him.

“Where are we going?”

“Motor pool” Doyle tossed back over his shoulder.

*************************

Doyle knew the way, knew the area well, so he drove. Bodie had wanted to sign out the sporty TR7, but Doyle had pointed out that they were staking out a derelict area and a flash car like that would be a dead giveaway. Bodie sat now in the passenger seat of an obscure rust bucket, the body work at odds with its powerful and smooth running engine, as Doyle drove in his fast competent way.

“The docks are that way.” Bodie pointed out as Doyle drove past the turnoff.

Doyle didn’t answer, attention on the rear vision mirror. Bodie noticed and tensed up, feeling a familiar surge of adrenaline. “Problem?”

Doyle’s shoulder jerked. “I think we’re being followed.”

Bodie looked back over his seat. There were a line of cars behind them, the traffic was fairly heavy. “Which one.”

“Dunno. I just know we are.”

Bodie was derisive. “What? Psychic copper powers. They teach that in the Met?”  
Doyle glanced over at him. “Yeah, got an A for it.”

Bodie rolled his eyes and slunk back in his seat. “Where are we going?”  
“To see a man about a gun.”

“Doyle…”

“Come on Bodie, three nights on a deserted wharf. Freezing our arses off. To observe! I can find out more about what’s going on down there in one afternoon with the right informant.”

“Cowley didn’t say anything about investigating.”

“He didn’t say not to either.”

“That’s my line, you’re supposed to be by the book Detective Constable.”

“What book, Flight Sergeant?”

Bodie swiveled his head to look at his partner. The wind through the window ruffled Doyle’s curls and those easy-to-read eyes were daring him, challenging him. Bodie sighed. “Fine, but you do the explaining to Cowley when he goes ballistic.”

Doyle smiled his wide white smile, the smile that had women crumbling before him. He forgot about the split in his lip, which protested with a sharp stab.

Bodie exhaled noisily. “I can see you’re going to be trouble.”

“You’ll be rewarded in heaven my son.” Doyle intoned piously and glanced at the rear vision again.

Bodie caught the seriousness with which his partner regarded the traffic behind them and turned again himself but saw nothing out of the ordinary. Doyle was edgy though and Bodie had learned enough about Doyle over the last month or so to know that he had good instincts. Cowley had even told him so, one afternoon after the obstacle course, told him that he could learn a lot from the ex detective, if he’d just stop fighting the partnership and accepted Doyle for who he was. The old man had then said that Doyle had a coppers nose and to trust it. Could sniff a crim a mile away.

Bodie didn’t know if it were true or not but he wasn’t going to be unprepared if it was. He took his Browning and checked the magazine. The shoulder holster was something he’d never worn before and he shrugged out of his jacket in the small confines of the car to slip his arms through the bands. It was bulky and sat uncomfortably. He rolled his shoulders and pushed at the holster adjusting the straps.

“You’ll get used to it.” Doyle said cheerfully, flipping the indicator on and turning left.

“It’ll be great in summer.” Bodie said sourly, slotting his gun snugly into the holster, irked by his partners seemingly good mood. “Having to wear a jacket to cover it up.”

Doyle glanced over and nearly laughed. Bodie was wearing a perfectly discontented expression, a welcome change from that bored indifference and he looked miserably out of his element, trying to get the bulky holster comfortable under his arm. Still, grumbling or not, he was, admittedly, a reassuring presence in the passenger seat, carrying an aura of menacing invincibility about him that was hard pressed to ignore. If he ever got used to them being partners, Doyle had a feeling that Bodie wouldn’t ever let him down. He wondered again why he’d had no choice in joining CI5. Bodie didn’t seem the sort that could be coerced into anything. He then wondered if he’d get a truthful answer if he asked.

The tail he was sure they had was itching at his neck and he checked the mirror again. Bodie didn’t seem to feel it, but Doyle had too many years on a bobby’s beat to not heed that subtle warning. And too many years on the mean streets of his youth developing it. He turned left again and a disreputable area of London emerged.

Bodie’s lip curled in disgust. “Charming. Home is it?”

Doyle refused to be baited. “One of many.” He pulled into a parking spot outside an adult shop and killed the engine.

There were overflowing rubbish bins on the footpath and a drunk was sleeping in the doorway. Doyle alighted from the car and sauntered unhurriedly over to the door. Bodie heaved a sigh, thought momentarily of his cell back in the police station where Cowley had found him, and followed his partner. This was all new territory to him. He’d been creeping around a jungle while Doyle was cutting his teeth on these mean streets. Why Cowley had wanted him was still a mystery to Bodie, especially now watching Doyle, who was as confident in this concrete jungle as Bodie had been in the real thing. Why Cowley had paired him with Doyle still escaped him as well, yet he couldn’t help but wonder if a few years of CI5 would mould him in the same street smart manner his partner was currently displaying.

Ray Doyle was bending down to the drunk as though to hold a conversation but instead he gazed down the street, studying the traffic as it passed. The drunk snored oblivious. Bodie waited, fastidiously out of proximity of the drunk’s fragrant odour until Doyle straightened up again.

“Have you spotted him?”

Doyle shook his head. “No.” But he knew it was happening all the same. “He’s good whoever he is.”

He stood with that utter stillness he was capable of, gazing at the traffic. Bodie waited patiently. Doyle shook his head as though baffled, then swiveled on his heel and led the way around the back of the shop, down a narrow alleyway, heedless of the filth and litter. Bodie gave it a grim look and followed, his immaculate leather shoes stepping carefully over items he’d rather not examine too closely. The back door of the shop was so in need of paint and repair it was almost indistinguishable from the dirty grey wall surrounding it, and it looked like it hadn’t been opened in centuries.

Doyle used his fist to bash at the door. He used considerable force so that the door rattled on its ancient hinges. Footsteps sounded from inside and the door opened a crack, held in place by a safety chain.

“Gerry.” Doyle said pleasantly to the grizzled unshaven face that appeared. “Long time no see.”

The face looked comically alarmed and made to shut the door. But faster than Gerry could put thought to action, Doyle had the barrel of his gun through the gap and pointed straight between his startled eyes. He froze instantly and stared at that yawning promise of death, like a dazed oversized rabbit.

“I can shoot faster than you can run Gerry. Now be a good fella and open the door. Or I’ll kick it in.” Doyle’s voice turned nasty as he added. “After I shoot you.”

Bodie was quietly impressed. This was a different Doyle from the training. This was a Doyle who clearly knew what he was doing, a Doyle who could go from pleasant to mean in a split second and he did mean extremely well.

Gerry looked unhappily at the gun, then back up to the hard man holding it. Of all the rotten luck. DC Doyle, as unpredictable as ever, smiling infectiously like a cherubic imp one minute and full blown hard and nasty the next. He cursed himself for not checking the door before opening it, but he’d been expecting Henderson who was bringing some fenced goods. Hadn’t for a minute expected anybody else, and certainly not the man currently standing there. Having a gun magically appear out of thin air and pointed right between his eyes caused sweat to bead on his forehead and his heart to race in panicked sympathy. Particularly as he recalled a small item of interest someone had passed on to him. That Doyle had left the force.

Doyle as a copper was bad enough, Doyle as an ex copper, without the restraints of his occupation was frightening and unpredictable enough to carry out his threat. Self-preservation quickly won out, giving him little choice but to acquiesce, however reluctantly, to the demand for admittance.

Doyle reversed the weapon from the door, holding it ready at the lock just in case. Bodie moved subtly sideways and positioned himself ready for trouble. But Gerry evidently believed Doyle’s threat, because they heard the sound of the chain being removed and the door opened. Gerry stood there, sizable paunch clad in a grubby windcheater, tangled grey hair complementing a face lined and weary with the world.

“Heard you left the force.” He protested as Doyle pushed his way in. He glanced at Bodie in trepidation as he followed and what he saw didn’t decrease his jitters one bit. “Who’s he?”

“Never mind who he is.” Doyle said in a hard voice. “You just concern yourself with me. Gun running at the south London docks. What do you know?  
”  
Gerry stared at him in unfeigned surprise. “Know? Don’t know nothing about it, do I? No one’s used that area for years. They come in by air, you know that, you’ve busted enough of ‘em.”

Doyle leaned casually against the wall, leaned so that he was towering over the shorter man, leaned with one arm up, gun dangling in full mesmerising view, right in front of the grubby smaller mans panic stricken eyes. “You holding out on me Gerry.”

“No.” Gerry looked suddenly stricken. “I swear. I don’t know nothing about no gun running through the docks. No one’s done it that way for years. And I’d know if anyone would, they’d need a buyer wouldn’t they. I swear I’m telling the truth Mr Doyle.”

Doyle remained leaning over him, utterly still again and Bodie marveled at the way he held the suspense. Then, unexpectedly Doyle glanced across to him, tilted his head and raised his brows as though asking Bodie’s opinion. Bodie gave a barely perceptible shrug; and a raised brow back; it was Doyle’s show, the ball in his court.

Doyle’s eyes flickered with amusement and his lips curled as though about to smile, before he turned back to Gerry. “You get out there and find out Gerry. And let me know.”

“But you’ve left. Left the force for good.”

Doyle gave him a hard look. “Who said?”

“You mean you haven’t left the force?”

Bodie spoke lazily: “Who said?”

Gerry looked helplessly from one to the other. “Well are you a copper still, or not?”

Bodie decided it was his turn. Doyle had put the wind up Gerry good and proper, and Bodie had enjoyed the demonstration. He stepped over and Gerry looked up into that bruised eye and menacing face and trembled. As if Doyle wasn’t frightening enough on his own, he was now getting around with this bloke, a bloke who looked like violence promised and delivered.

“He’s not.” Bodie informed him softly. “He’s much worse now.”

That, he thought, should please Doyle and indeed his partner looked quite cheerful as they retraced their steps back to the street. Replacing his Browning back into the holster, Doyle unlocked the car, taking his time and unhurriedly gazing about the area.

“The tail?” Bodie was restless as he waited for Doyle to let him in.

“Yeah.” Doyle got in the car and leaned across to flick the passenger door lock.  
Bodie dropped into the passenger seat, slammed the door and leaned his elbow against the window frame. “Is he telling the truth?”

“Probably.” Doyle pushed the key into the ignition. “He wouldn’t be game not to. I hope. Unless someone heavier than me is leaning on him.”

“That wouldn’t be hard.” Bodie said pointedly, a jab at Doyle’s slim frame.

Doyle shot him a withering look. “But if there’s gun running happening, someone in this city will know about it and he’ll know about that someone.”  
He pushed the gear lever into first and flicked the indicator.

Bodie studied the dashboard thoughtfully. Doyle’s inquisitiveness was infectious. Somehow during the conversation with Gerry, Bodie had slipped from being uninterested in this whole caper to wondering whether Biggs knew anything. Biggs who had got him in this whole mess in the first place.

“Don’t suppose you can swing by the holding cells in Dawson Street.”

Doyle glanced across but Bodie’s face had reverted back to inscrutable. Doyle returned his attention to the traffic.

“Got a mate in there have you?”

“Could say that.” Bodie rubbed gently at his healing eye.

Doyle shrugged “Why not, still got a couple of hours before dark.”

He spun the wheel and pulled out into the steadily moving traffic. Five seconds later a beat up old Cortina pulled out and followed them.

 

 

***************

**Chapter 6**

 

The holding cells were only one step up from the overnight cells and were not designed for long term occupancy, although detainees were sometimes held for a couple of months awaiting their court hearings. The smell of disinfectant, urine, boiled cabbage and dirty laundry was strong in the air. Doyle knew the cells from his time in the force but he leaned casually against the counter and allowed Bodie to deal with the man in charge. Nose twitching in undisguised repugnance at the pervading odour, Bodie took out his ID card and flipped it open for the benefit of Sergeant Eric O’Sullivan.

“Bodie, CI5.” He gestured to Doyle, who looked quite relaxed leaning back on his elbows, feet crossed at the ankles. “Doyle.”

“Also CI5” Doyle amplified over his shoulder.

“Need to see Julian Biggs.” Bodie stated in a bored tone.

Sergeant O’Sullivan reacted much the same as any policeman worth his salt when confronted with CI5 ID cards and particularly the hard looking men displaying them.

“He’s in holding cell 18, down the corridor to your left. I’ll get Perkins to show you the way.”

Bodie turned to his partner and dangled his ID card in the air between thumb and forefinger. “Handy these eh? Wonder if they’ll get us the best table at a swish restaurant.”

“Cowley would love that.” Doyle agreed and pushed himself upright when the young Constable Perkins appeared. “What’s he in for, this Biggs?”

Bodie shrugged as though it wasn’t important. “Gun running.”

Doyle wrinkled his nose, sneeringly. “Is that all?”

“Well I did hear that he stole six sweets off a ten year old two years ago but it was never proven.”

Awaiting his hearing, Julian Biggs was as comfortable as he was ever going to get as a guest of Her Majesty’s Prison system. He was a lean medium height man with an unhealthy pallor to his skin and a nervous habit of smoothing his hands down his trousers, as though they were perpetually sweaty. His face demonstrated a peculiar mixture of surprise and apprehension when Perkins opened the door of the cell. Standing up hastily he backed away until he was flush against the wall under the window.

Jesus Christ, Bodie. What was he doing here? Why wasn’t he locked up? Biggs knew how dangerous Bodie was, having worked alongside him in the army. And here he was, large as life and twice as lethal. And accompanied by another hard case too, by the look of him. Who was he?

Bodie walked in, face absolutely unreadable and stood facing his old army mate. Doyle slipped in behind him and propped himself against the wall by the entrance, arms folded, one ankle negligently crossed over the other.

“It weren’t my fault Bodie.” Biggs hastily started to say. “I didn’t know someone had grassed I swear.”

“I’m not here for that.” Bodie said easily, friendly even.

Biggs opened his mouth in astonishment, then flicked nervous eyes to Doyle, deceptively casual by the door.

“How did you get off then?” Biggs didn’t move from the wall and he still looked worried.

Amused Doyle glanced from him to Bodie, seeing Bodies aggressive stance in the way his shoulders were set and in his eyes, which never left Biggs face. Biggs saw it too, at odds with Bodie’s easy tone, and if anything got even more anxious.

“Look, I meant what I said, I didn’t mean to get you involved, honest.”

“Who were you running for?” Bodie asked, voice still mild.

Biggs shook his head. “I can’t say, Bodie, he’ll kill me.”

“Tut tut Biggs.” Bodie abruptly changed persona mid stream and snarled. “I’ll kill you if you don’t say.” It had the desired effect for the object of his wrath turned a pale sickly colour.

“You can’t touch me in here.” Biggs voice was now breathless as though he’d run a long way and he was pressed so tight against the wall, Doyle was sure he’d leave an imprint in the brickwork.

“Yeah I can.” Bodie moved suddenly and swiftly. And unexpectedly. A small squeak of protest escaped Biggs’s vocal chords before one powerful hand wrapped around his throat and squeezed.

Doyle tensed, ready to intervene, not knowing how far Bodie would push it, whether he would pull back or cross that invisible line. Biggs’s eyes bulged and his face took on a bluish hue. Bodie released his grip slightly and Biggs drew in a lungful of air.

”Who and how?” Bodie gritted, brows drawn down fiercely, eyes boring into Biggs wide frightened ones.

“Carter.” Biggs gasped. “Overland from Southampton, it’s not as policed as Dover. Bodie for Gods Sake.”

Bodie abruptly let go and stepped back. Straightened his jacket and tugged his cuffs fussily, all the while keeping his satanic gaze on the hapless Biggs. “If I find out you’ve been lying Biggs...”

Biggs raised his head, hand massaging his throat and coughed weakly. He stared at Bodie as though he was the Grim Reaper, then flicked frightened eyes to Doyle, who, despite his curls and impish face - in his opinion – managed to appear just as ruthless looking.

Bodie turned and looked triumphantly at Doyle. Doyle began to grin but stopped abruptly as he remembered his lip. Bodie walked past his partner to the door and Doyle made to follow. Pausing mid turn Doyle looked back over his shoulder. “Oh, and good luck at the trial Biggs.”

Biggs lay where he had fallen, hands still at his throat, eyes wide and scared.

They walked out companionably and down the corridor leaving Perkins to lock up holding Cell 18 containing a very relieved, yet even more nervous Biggs. A policewoman was coming from the opposite direction, walking briskly and efficiently. She was young, very pretty and her face shone with enthusiasm. She watched Doyle as she approached almost with the air of having seen him before, but didn’t acknowledge him. Doyle let a half smile curl his lips and his eyes took on a lazy satisfied gleam. Bodie brightened visibly and his lean handsome face altered to become both charming and welcoming. Both men let her walk past and then, in perfect tandem, turned to watch the view. She looked back once, bestowing a small appreciative smile on both of them, lingering slightly longer on Bodie.

“Nice” Bodie murmured as the long nyloned legs disappeared around the corner. “I might have to review my opinion regarding the fuzz around here.”

Doyle regarded him coldly and Bodie gave him a singularly innocent look in return.

“You think she’d have a piece of you? An ex crim?” Doyle asked. Just the right amount of scorn laced his words. With Biggs’s babbling, Doyle now knew why Bodie was in CI5. But he wasn’t sure how he felt about it.

Bodie straightened the lapels of his jacket. “Ex crim? There’s no record under my name.”

Doyle didn’t doubt it, Cowley wouldn’t have anyone with a record on his books but Cowley also wouldn’t have a guilty man in his employ either.

“And yes as a matter of fact, I think she would.” Bodie went on. “There was this girl in Africa…”

Doyle turned and began to walk again. “She’s not in your class hotshot.”

Bodie raised a brow. “Do I detect a challenge? Hmmm? Shall we place bets?”

Doyle halted, shoved his hands in the back pockets of his faded jeans and faced his partner. “A bet? Over a girl?”

Bodie rubbed his hands together gleefully; he hadn’t forgotten the barmaid in the Ten Bells. “A fiver says I win her first?”

“A fiver? Last of the big spenders I see.”

Bodie considered his partner, sensing he was hiding something. Doyle looked smug, full lips itching to grin and the cut in his lip preventing it. Bodie couldn’t resist Doyle in a good mood. It was far preferable than the prickly temper and worth the effort and expense to expose it. “If you think you’d lose you only have to say so.”

“OK. You’re on.”

“Good.” Bodie’s self-satisfied smirk spread across his face.

Doyle did grin then and immediately winced. “Pay up.”

“What do you mean pay up.”

“I had her the weekend before I joined this outfit. Kelly Evans. Constable Kelly Evans.”

“Wait a minute.” Bode protested. “She didn’t seem to know you just then.”

“Ah, well that’d be because I helped her with her first level exams. One thing led to another and fraternisation between work colleagues is strictly forbidden you know. Would jeopardise her career to give me a kiss in the corridor.”

Bodie rolled his eyes in disgust, but it was worth the fiver when Doyle laughed at him. Low and dirty and decidedly contagious it rolled unexpectedly out of him and lightened the dim dank corridor with its cheeriness. Grumbling, Bodie dug in his pocket and pulled out a note. “Suppose you can prove it?”

“You didn’t ask for proof.” Doyle took the fiver and laughed again. “But you can ask her if you like. Mind the other eye if you do though, she’s a black belt.”  
He tucked the note into his jeans pocket and tilted his head towards the front desk. “Shall we go?”

“Where to now?” Bodie asked and Doyle glanced at his watch.

“Just enough time to get some food and coffee and I suppose we’d better get ourselves hidden before the old man finds out what we’re doing.”

“Good.” Bodie pressed a hand to his flat abdomen. “I’m starving.”

“Don’t look it.” observed Doyle and pushed the front door open.

In the carpark two men in a Cortina watched them leave the building and walk to their car.

Doyle stopped at the car, keys in hand and frowned irritably, good mood fleeing along with the autumn leaves skidding past his legs. Bodie glanced at him, then around the carpark. “You still worried about a tail.”

Doyle gave him a sharp look as he unlocked the car. “He’s there Bodie, I can feel him.”

Bodie lifted a hand in a conciliatory way. “Yeah yeah, I heard you. Only why’s he tailing us then, if he’s not going to actually do anything.”

”I’ll ask him when I get my hands on him.” Doyle gritted out and dropped into the drivers seat. He leaned across, unlocked the door and Bodie dropped in beside him. “What did Biggs mean by you getting off?”

Bodie glanced across to see curiosity written all over Doyle’s open face. He considered what to tell him, then figured that Doyle could just as easily find out through his old pals in the Met.

“I was visiting when he got busted. They thought I was in on it.”

“And you weren’t?” Doyle pressed.

Bodie didn’t answer.

 

 

 


	3. Doyle & Bodie - Beginnings Part 3

Chapter 7

 

George Cowley was signing remittances when the phone rang. Not taking his eyes off the paperwork in front of him he picked up the receiver. “Cowley.”

“Call from 1.9” came the impersonal voice of the radio operator.

“Patch him through,” Cowley took off his glasses and rubbed at his eyes.  
“Alpha -, 1.9.”

“Go ahead 1.9.” Cowley could see the agent in his mind as he listened. Bob Turner was hard and ruthless and didn’t back down from anything. He and his partner Michael Grimsby were his most senior agents.

“Tailed your boys. You were right. 4.5 has been chasing down contacts, one Gerald Fitzpatrick, small dealer in the arms business but he knows who’s who in the buyers. And then they visited the holding cells in Dawson Street.”

“Holding cells?” Cowley murmured. Julian Biggs, Bodie’s ex army mate who’d been gun running, was being held in the Dawson Street cells, waiting his court case. “Smart lads.”

“Do you want us to keep on them?” Turner asked.

“Make sure they get to the docks then report back.”

“Just one thing Sir, I think they’ve made us.”

“Spotted you? Careless, Turner. They have or you think they have?”

“Think they have Sir and it’s not through carelessness. Seems to be 4.5 that’s sensed us, he’s looking, but I don’t think he’s actually spotted us.”

Cowley smiled briefly. Good instincts that boy. “Quite likely, but never mind that now, proceed to the docks.”

You don’t want a watch on them? They are armed sir.”

“No, the raid isn’t till tomorrow night. They can have a night to themselves. Ensure they set up and report back 1.9, Alpha out.”

Cowley put the phone down and leaned back, thinking about his latest team. That would be Doyle instigating criminal contacts instead of obeying orders, he’d known that would happen, had tested him to find out. That Bodie had tracked down his gun running flat mate, however, surprised him. He’d thought he’d have to push Bodie more before he took the initiative. Push him harder again to take an interest in a job he didn’t want or apply for. But then Doyle had a curiosity that would have killed ten cats by now and it was bound to rub off eventually. Maybe pairing them together was beginning to work earlier than he expected.

*********************

Raymond Doyle with his police background had done his fair share of surveillances. So long as there was something to watch, something to do, he could hold his own, despite patience still not being his strong point. Diligently he sat by the broken window just to the side out of view and scanned the empty wharf. Pigeons cooed sleepily and the wind blew eerily but there was not a soul in sight. Even the boats and ferries, chugging endlessly along the Thames didn’t venture into this little backwater with its derelict buildings earmarked for demolition.

Bodie’s previous surveillance experiences had involved a wet humid jungle and the promise of a death wish if he gave himself away. Sitting in a broken down old warehouse, on a condemned wharf, surrounded by the cold remains of a takeaway Chinese dinner and an unaccustomed shoulder holster chafing his back and side was testing even his ability to stay remotely indifferent.

“How do we even know it’s the right wharf?” he asked shifting on the old crate and stretching his back to ease the tightness of the straps  
.  
“Because it’s the only derelict one.” Doyle replied not removing his gaze from the wharf. It was getting harder to see, the sun, what there was of it behind the scudding clouds had dropped below the horizon and the lights of London were blinking on, one by one, like so many faeries coming out of hiding.

Bodie was bored. He shifted again and felt the weight of the objects he was carrying. He dug his hands into his jacket pockets and removed the box of ammunition and the RT, which he placed on the crate beside the empty takeaway containers. He considered removing the holster but thought better of it, it wouldn’t do to not be armed in the unlikely event something happened. He shot his partner a dirty look. Doyle was used to wearing a holster and his was nearly invisible under his leather jacket. He sat comfortably by the window, one long denim clad leg propped against the sill, elbow leaning casually on his knee. One slim finger gently probed the healing cut in his lip and a slight frown sat between those wide greenish blue eyes. Bodie was getting a handle on his partner now. Something was bothering Ray Doyle and he was pretty sure he wouldn’t like what that something was.

As though reading his mind Doyle said. “Something just isn’t right.”

_Told you so_ , Bodie told himself. He heaved a sigh and got to his feet to stretch. The cold was coming in and he was glad he had switched his suit jacket for a warm anorak. “What does it matter? We’re just here to do what the old man said.”

Doyle swung his head to glare at his partner. “That’s what doesn’t make sense. We sit here doing nothing, watching nothing when we could be nailing them. And the tail has gone. Why have we stopped being followed?”

Bodie looked impatient, dark brows drawn over his dark blue eyes. Doyle knew that he hadn’t quite believed him about the tail. He also knew full well that Bodie was bored. He’d tried to hide it, but either his boredom was making him careless or he was beginning to relax enough around his partner to let it show, but his face was more animated now and slightly easier to read. He guessed that whatever colourful life Bodie had led, it hadn’t involved sitting in a crumbling warehouse on a hazardous dock waiting for something, anything to happen.

Bodie’s lean smooth countenance was somewhat miffed as he approached the window. It was quite dark now and the dock was invisible. “Even if there is someone down there, we aren’t going to see him are we?”

“So why are we sitting here?” Doyle pointed out as the last of the light faded from the western horizon. He tried to keep the impatience at bay but a surveillance could still test it, even after all this time.

********************

“So,” said Bodie a couple of hours later as he poured out the last of the hot coffee, carefully keeping the pencil torch sheltered. Its pinpoint of light was barely enough to see by and he switched it off as soon as the cups were full. “How did you get through these nights in the Met then? Played twiddly winks? Eye spy?”

Doyle thought Bodie must be really bored to try and get a rise out of him now. “Normally I’d bring a girl along, play strip poker, but most of the ones I know don’t like an audience.”

“Could have told me that earlier.” Bodie grumbled as he brought a cup of coffee to his partner, still by the window. “Here.”

Doyle looked up and took the proffered cup. “Ta.”

Bodie leaned against the opposite side of the window. “Is it what you thought?”

“What?” Doyle took a mouthful. It was sweeter than he liked but he wasn’t complaining.

“The job. CI5.”

Doyle shrugged, carefully not spilling his coffee. “Dunno, thought there’d be more action, less sitting around. Suppose there might be when we aren’t so new.”

Bodie nodded. “Yeah.”

Doyle saw his opening. “What about you? Rather be in that cell would you?”

Bodie glanced down but could only see Doyle’s outline now, lit only by the lights on the far side of the river. “Suppose not. It’s a job, like any other job and I gotta do something.”

“A bit more than that wouldn’t you say?”

“How do you mean?”

“Well this is the big league. You heard Cowley, terrorists, assassins, extremists, bombers, it’s not petty B&E’s we’re dealing with now you know. This gun run, probably destined for the black market and on to bank robberies, muggings, innocent people getting hurt.”

“No such thing as innocent people.” Bodie scoffed.

“Then why are you here.” Doyle flared up, the confinement and uselessness of their assignment stretching his patience to the max.

Bodie stared at the faint outline that was Doyle; sure he could see his eyes sparking blue even in the pitch dark of the warehouse. If anything would make this lousy surveillance even lousier it would be Doyle in a full on hissy fit. Bodie decided against provoking him further. They were both feeling the inactivity of this job, after two months of solid physical training. He remembered his partner laughing his free unrestrained laugh at the holding cells that afternoon. How often did anyone ever hear it? Doyle needed to take things less seriously sometimes, stop taking on the world by himself. If Bodie had to accept having a partner, then so could Doyle and he’d no longer have an excuse to do everyone on his own.

Bodie waited a minute and then answered his partner’s belligerence in an even voice: “To watch your back.”

Doyle’s temper extinguished instantly. But before he cold respond they both heard it. The faint sound of a motor, wheezing, grumbling, a small lorry.

Doyle sat up quickly, dropping his coffee cup. Bodie edged closer to the wall and peered out. From the distant road two small pinpoints of light steadily grew bigger. The lorry negotiated its journey by sidelights, outline just faintly visible. It looked like an old army troop carrier, sadly out of tune, with a sagging canvas cover instead of a hard top. It coughed and spluttered in the low gear, getting closer and closer until it finally heaved to an idling stop. Then revving the engine, the driver negotiated a painful three-point turn to bring the vehicle around, facing the way it had come. On the last turn he reversed to the edge of the wharf.

“Looks like we have our runners.” Bodie said softly and his voice was no longer bored or indifferent.

Doyle switched his gaze to the distant Thames in time to see the lights of a small boat approaching. “And here comes the goods.”

Bodie tilted his gaze and saw it too. His gun was now a comforting presence under his left arm although it was doubtful he’d use it. If he obeyed orders that is. “Don’t know how Cowley expects us to see anything without a light.”

Doyle grunted, watching as the boat got nearer. “Fishing trawler do you think?”

Bodie knew boats; he had spent some time on them in his youth. “Converted one, don’t think he does his fishing in the sea now.”

They watched as two men spilled from the lorry, walking towards the river, the beam of small torches lighting their steps. The boat reached the dock and the mooring ropes were tossed up, to be wrapped carelessly around the only halyard left on the grey splintered wharf. Then the cargo was unloaded.

Bodie squinted at the boxes being brought up. “Small weapons if that’s the size of them. What do you reckon they are?”

“Handguns maybe.” Doyle was watching the men, but they were little more than indistinct shapes. Then they heard another motor, this time a car and it ran smoothly and well tuned, purring up to the lorry and turning easily in the narrow confines.

“Ford Granada.” Bodie said under his breath and felt his partner nod. “Must be the boss coming to check up on them.”

The boss alighted from the car, but left the engine running. He obviously didn’t plan on staying long. The cargo had been transferred cleanly and the men undid the moorings allowing the trawler to pull away. The torch beams skittered back to the lorry. One man broke off from the others and made his way to the driver’s side of the Granada. There was muted conversation and then the driver struck a match. To Bodie and Doyle, whose pupils had dilated from their time in the near blackness of the warehouse, the flame was shockingly bright. It lit up the face of the man who held it to a cigarette between his lips.

Bodie felt his partner tense, heard his indrawn breath hiss as though in shock. “Doyle?”

“Jesus Christ.” Doyle was up and running before Bodie could say another word.

He heard his partner crash, swearing, into unseen obstacles as he hared for the door and after a startled pause, Bodie was up and after him. Outside the car started up and pulled away. Doyle was still recklessly sprinting for the indistinct doorway and Bodie chased him thinking how Cowley was going to have a fit if they were caught disobeying orders. And he was reasonably sure that Cowley’s stipulated no contact order, didn’t quite include Doyle throwing himself like a madman into the middle of the whole exchange. The lorry’s motor cranked into life and Doyle made the door. Bodie saw his silhouette for a brief moment before he disappeared down the external stairs. Shit shit shit, Bodie, without thinking about the consequences, without thinking of personal risk, without even considering why he was blindly following a partner hell bent on a suicide mission, unhesitatingly followed.

The car was way ahead, the troop carrier gaining speed, second gear protesting loudly. Doyle was haring after the lorry, his natural speed and athletic build no contest for the lumbering vehicle and he gained the back of the lorry grabbing onto the guide rails and hauling himself aboard. Bodie sprinted after him and saw that he’d have to really gear up the old leg muscles if he wasn’t to be left behind. Doyle, momentarily surprised that his partner had followed, saw him and leaned down, reaching out. Bodie caught up with the lorry as it slowed slightly to negotiate a pile of broken wooden beams piled haphazardly across the roadway and Doyle grabbed his arm, hauling him up until Bodie could get his left hand on the rail. The lorry gained speed and Doyle reached his other hand down past Bodie, grabbed his belt and managed to pull his partner on board. Bodie was gasping for breath, and he looked up, seeing nothing but the halo of Doyle’s curls against the brightening streetlights as the vehicle took the turn off the wharf in top gear, past the broken gates and onto the road.

Doyle leaned down close to Bodie and put a finger to his lips. Bodie tried to quiet his breathing but he saw what Doyle was warning him about. The rear of the vehicle was separated from the drivers cab by a small window, one glance back and they’d be seen. Doyle pointed wordlessly upwards and Bodie nodded. They’d have to ride on the roof and move quickly while the unlit wharfs hid them from the driver’s rear vision mirror. Silently they moved back to the opening, climbed carefully out and using the guide rails managed to get up on the roof. The canvas was tatty and torn in places, exposing the metal framework. The roof sagged a little under their weight but held. It wasn’t a particularly big vehicle and it looked more like it should be in a museum than on a dock receiving an illegal arms shipment.

“What the hell are you doing?” Bodie had got his breath back and used it.

Ignoring him, Doyle had his RT in his hand, holding it close to his mouth to keep his voice down. “4.5 to base.”

“Go ahead 4.5” came the dispatchers voice, tinny and remote from the receiver.

“Patch me through to Alpha, it’s urgent.”

“Will do, hold on.”

Doyle held the RT ready his mind whirling with what he had seen. Bodie, watching, saw that set and determined expression, similar to the one he’d been wearing when Macklin had first tested him.

“Go ahead 4.5.”

Cowley’s voice came through, crisp and crackling and authoritative. “Alpha one.”  
“Sir.” Doyle kept his voice low, all but hissing. “This isn’t right, it’s…”

The lorry lurched suddenly as the driver took a corner at the last minute. Both of them lurched with it, Doyle throwing down his left arm, trying to keep a grip on the RT with the other. Horns blared behind and around them.

“4.5?”

They could hear Cowley’s demanding voice even over the noise of the lorry grinding through the gears, through the other cars braking and squealing. The troop carrier leaned precariously, negotiating the curve. Bodie who was closer to the edge of the roof slid with it and unable to recover, found himself flailing out, his upper body jackknifing over the roof edge, his weight aiding the vehicle’s motion – doing its utmost to send him flying off into orbit. Doyle instinctively reached out to grab him. “Hang on.”

“Christ.” Bodie felt his momentum, saw the lane markings on the road flashing horribly too close to his face, saw the giant tyres rumbling and spinning and could imagine the result if he landed under one.

Doyle threw himself forward, his hands grabbing anorak and leg and Bodie’s momentum halted. He caught a brief flash of something black and rectangular flying past his head. A remote part of him recognised it as Doyle’s RT, which had been in his partner’s hand when the truck lurched. That same remote part of him remembered his own RT, on the crate where he had left it with the remains of the Chinese food. The crate that Doyle, by the sound of it, had crashed into on his mad dash for the door. Despite the perilous situation it now left them in however, he was fervently glad that Doyle had chosen to save him rather than the communication device. He scrabbled backwards with his hands and caught the rails where they were exposed by the rotted canvas. Doyle pulled at his belt and coat and with his partners assistance he managed to get the rest of his upper body back onto the roof. Doyle lay back and swallowed looking heavenward. Bodie lay back and gulped air. They looked at each other. For a brief moment their dangerous situation faded away as they both realised what could have just happened.

_“One man in a thousand Solomon says, will stick more close than a brother”_ Bodie quoted softly.

Doyle gave him a strange look.

“Kipling” Bodie explained distantly, then gathered his wits about him sufficiently to nod at his partner. “Thanks.”

******************

“4.5! Doyle, come in.” Cowley stared at the telephone in front of him. It was as dead as a dodo. He pressed the receiver down and spoke to the dispatcher. “Get me 1.9 and 2.6.”

“Roger Sir.”

Cowley leaned over and pressed the playback on the machine in front of him. All communications in CI5 were dutifully recorded to be carefully analysed should the need arise. He heard Doyle’s voice, heard a rumbling noise in the background, the sound of gears grinding. Heard Doyle’s breathless angry words. _This isn’t right it’s…_ Then Bodie swearing, a clattering noise, horns blaring, tyres squealing and a loud crunch before that dead silence.

The door opened and Bob Turner and Michael Grimsby walked in. They’d been about to head off home when their Chief’s demand came in.

Cowley looked up. “4.5 and 3.7. Listen to this.”

He replayed the tape again. Turner winced. Cowley glared at the machine, as though it were deliberately withholding information, then decisively he stood up.

“Something’s happened. We’d better get down there.”

Turner stood swinging a powerful torch on the abandoned derelict floor of the warehouse while Grimsby poked around down on the dock. Cowley stood beside him and his face was harsh. A crate was overturned, the shambles of a meal strewn across the floor. A box of ammunition lay scattered around a broken coffee cup and in the middle of the mess an RT device.

“Looks like a struggle.” Turner said bluntly. “Been jumped.”

“By whom man – no one knew they were here, a simple surveillance.” Cowley face bore the unmistakable signs of trouble. “And nothing to watch tonight at that.”

“Then someone else was using the place for something.” Turner said and Cowley could only agree. And he’d landed his two raw recruits right in the middle of that something. It burned in his gut.

“Get this place sealed and I want it going over with a fine tooth comb. I want to know where they are and what happened.”

Turner nodded and left the torch with his boss while he trotted back to the Cortina, which was parked alongside the rust bucket Doyle had signed from the car pool. He didn’t like the chances of finding anything, but he’d worked for George Cowley long enough to know the old man would take it personally if anything happened to them.

*********************

CI5 had it’s own Forensics, it’s own Ballistics and no expense was spared to have the best. Aided by powerful lights, the floor of the warehouse was lit to almost daylight luminance. Several men, with their own brand of professionalism crawled and poked among the debris of the room. Cowley stood fuming at the delay.

It was well after midnight before Ted Burwood approached him. “Not a thing. If there were any shooting, it wasn’t in here.”

Cowley recalled his instructions to Doyle and Bodie. He’d ordered them not to shoot, forbidden them any contact. But everything he knew and had learned about the blasted pair indicated they would have ignored that if it suited them. He glanced around trying to picture what could have happened. None of it made sense.

“They must have been surprised.” Burwood indicated the overturned crate, the RT, still lying where it had fallen. “Taken before they could draw their weapons.”

Cowley didn’t believe that either. Not after witnessing Ray Doyle’s speed with a handgun, Bodie’s physical power on the matt with Macklin. They were capable men or they wouldn’t be in CI5. Capable of looking after themselves. Though who knew…he thought to himself suddenly… who knew what the other would do, if one of them had a gun held to his head. He surely didn’t.

He surveyed the mess yet again and turned to the window. A single coffee cup lay there, its contents spilled, soaked into the floorboards. He gazed down at the wharf, lit by more lights as his men scoured the area. No, they’d seen something. Something that had led them to a fight in here, a fight that for some reason excluded the need to shoot, something that had provoked Doyle to try that desperate call to him, but he couldn’t think what it could have been.

“The other RT is missing.” He said finally. “Find it.”

Burwood shrugged but didn’t say what he was thinking, although Cowley saw it clearly on his face regardless. If one of his agents was still in possession of the missing RT, why weren’t they using it to call in?

*****************

**Chapter 8**

 

The night air rushed past them. The lorry had finally stopped screaming recklessly around corners and was now on the motorway, leaving London behind. Bodie had done some harebrained stunts in his time, but riding the motorway on top of an aging old army vehicle with a roof likely to give way under their weight at any given moment, on an Autumn night with the temperature rapidly falling, all on the whim of a new partner who was as impetuous as he was short tempered, had to be up there with the best. They huddled down keeping a firm grip on the exposed roll cage trying to keep out of the slipstream.

“So who is he?” Bodie asked leaning to speak closer to Doyle’s ear. “This joker you want badly enough to ride this rollercoaster of death for?”

Doyle turned his face towards his partner and Bodie could see his eyes gleaming in the flashing lights of passing vehicles. Everything that Ray Doyle felt invariably showed in those greenish blue eyes of his, and right now they were passionately showing a hatred that Bodie hoped to God wasn’t directed at him.

“Three years ago, maybe a dozen kids went missing in the East End.” Doyle said through clenched teeth. “We found some of them, what was left of them. And we found a piece of evidence that told us who had done it. Dennis Ferguson. Only he was tipped off, disappeared into thin air. The case is still open, he’s still wanted.”

Bodie had a dreadful premonition where this was going.

Doyle sniffed against the cold air and turned his head away again. “No one has seen him in three years. Till now. When he lit that cigarette.”

“You can’t be sure.” Bodie said. “He was a fair distance.”

“I’m sure.” Doyle told him and his voice throbbed, hard and angry, hating. “I’d know that bastard if he shaved his head and wore women’s clothing. It was him, and I’m going to get him.”

“He got in the car.” Bodie reminded his partner. He didn’t say that Doyle was no longer a copper and it wasn’t a CI5 case. He doubted it would have made a difference if he had.

“Yeah but he’s in on this deal whatever it is.” Doyle said turning back finally. “It’s the first break in three years and I’m not letting go of it.”

“What about Cowley?”

“What about him?”

“He’ll go spare.”

Doyle shrugged unrepentant. “He didn’t see those kids. I did.”

Bodie lay on the top of the canvas and looked heavenward. There were no stars, there were never any stars, not like some of the places he had been too. “So what was the evidence?”

He thought for a minute Doyle wasn’t going to answer him. But eventually his partners voice came softly out of the darkness. “A piece of film, it hadn’t burned properly in an incinerator at his last known address. The lab boys got on to it. It showed him and the last victim.”

Doyle broke off but Bodie got the picture. He stayed silent.

The lorry sped onwards, houses giving way to countryside, small rural properties appearing and disappearing. Bodie was getting so cold his hands were beginning to numb. Beside him Doyle, wearing just a leather jacket over his T-shirt was shivering uncontrollably.

“We could just take the driver.” Bodie ventured at last. “Make him talk.”

Doyle shook his head. He remembered last time, how Ferguson had got the tip off, had disappeared. One sniff of a bust and he’d be gone again. He’d know if one of his colleagues went missing in action. And then, so would he. Doyle didn’t intend for that to happen. “He’d find out. We have to lie low, wait for him to come back.”

“What about the gun running?” Bodie asked and Doyle gave a jerk. He’d almost forgotten their assignment.

“Well if we’re lucky we’ll get both won’t we? Soon as we get to where we’re going you can suss out the boxes, weapons are your forte.”

He turned his head in time to see Bodie give him a severe look. “If we don’t freeze to death first.”

But the truck was slowing, turning off the main motorway, rumbling down a country lane and they were forced to use their frozen hands to stay in one place again.

**********************

Cowley stalked around headquarters like an angry bear and despite the late hour people were on the phones, agents were in their cars and Betty was hovering anxiously. Find them, he had said and his people were working overtime in an attempt to do so.

Turner and Grimsby followed him into his office where Cowley again turned on the recording.

“It’s some sort of truck.” Cowley said as he listened to the background noise. “But if they were put on a truck how did Doyle use the RT?”

“It was dark.” Grimsby said, folding his arms. Quite a bit shorter than his partner, he was much the same age and had a good background in detective work. “Maybe they didn’t see Doyle using it at first and then got it off him soon as they saw. Could explain how he was cut off.”

“Yes but not how he was using it in the first place. He’d have to use his hands man. Meaning they weren’t tied, and you’d have to tie them both hand and foot to snatch them. They may be new but they aren’t totally useless.” He glared at Grimsby. “If you were put in a truck untied, would you just sit there like a sacrificial nanny goat?”

Cowley rewound the tape again and closed his eyes as though to hear better. “They couldn’t have been restrained and they weren’t searched. If the RT wasn’t found then it’s possible their weapons weren’t either. So why didn’t they use them?”

“Obeying orders.” Turner ventured, if knowing even as he said it that he’d get a rollicking for it.

Cowley shot him a baleful look and snorted. “Since when did any of my men obey orders if it didn’t suit them. Not you Turner, not Grimsby either. And not those two tearaways.”

He pressed the play switch again, and again they heard the confusing noises, Doyle’s voice, hissing and angry. Angry. Not worried or anxious. Angry. Cowley dug his fingers into his eyes. It just didn’t make sense.

“Sounds like other cars.” Turner said more helpfully this time. “A near miss judging by the horns, could be that the drivers may remember the incident.”

“Aye. Get on to the Met. See if they’ve had any complaints from motorists in the area around those docks. I want to know every one, no matter how minor. And get on to Burwood, see if he’s got anything on tyre prints yet.”

************************

Doyle was so cold he was worried about losing his grip and sliding off the roof altogether. He glanced at Bodie, but Bodie looked, as always, impenetrable. At least he had a decent anorak on, keeping him warm although even he had a bluish tint to his lips and his eyes were over bright. Doyle felt guilty for being the cause of this discomfort even though he hadn’t technically made Bodie come after him. In fact he’d been surprised that he had. Any previous partners he’d had on the force would likely have reported him the minute he’d run out the room not giving a thought to backing him up. Except for Syd, but Doyle refused to think about Syd now.

But Bodie had no hesitation in going after him, even when he hadn’t known why. Doyle had mixed feelings about it. He’d thought that Bodie didn’t care enough about anything, but he’d been wrong there. He cared enough to disobey orders and follow Doyle to the lorry, and he’d been tactful enough to stop the questions about Ferguson which was just as well as Doyle had enough trouble controlling his rage as the memories dredged up. Ferguson. Doyle couldn’t believe it when he’d seen that hateful face, illuminated by the flare of the match. It was a face he wasn’t likely to forget. He had to get him this time. If not for the parents of the dead kids, then for the possible victims yet to come. His teeth began to chatter and he tried to dredge up the anger again, at least that had kept the cold at bay. He thought of his extra coat, still in the car at the wharf and wished he had on.

The lorry slowed and turned through some gates, down another lane, leafy and narrow, so that now they were in danger of being swept off by tree branches. The flattened themselves as much as possible against the roof, but then they were clear and the lorry was finally rumbling to a stop. The sudden silence was shocking, punctuated only by the hissing and popping of the motor cooling down. There were lights in front of them and the air smelled earthy, rich and manured. The country smell of horses and leather overlaid it all and Doyle cautiously raised his head. The house was lit only by one small window and looked rundown. Overgrown weeds and broken machinery lay scattered around the old brickwork and the glass in the window frame was dirty. The lorry door suddenly opened and the driver stepped down and Doyle dropped his head, out of sight again. Bodie dug him in the side and Doyle glanced across to see his partner trying to support his weight across the steel roll bar in order not to give himself away by sagging on the canvas. Doyle followed suit.

Another door opened somewhere and a voice called out. “That you Dennis?”

The drivers voice answered, moving around the lorry as he came towards the back. “No, he’s had to go see about the distribution. Give me a hand will you, they’re heavy.”

There was a metallic crash as the tailgate came down and the lorry shuddered as one of them hauled himself into it  
.  
“Any trouble?” the first voice queried.

“None. But no one uses that old dock, genius of Dennis to suggest it. Grab that edge Frank.”

There was the sound of grunting and the lorry rocked gently again. Doyle flexed his fingers, trying to bring some feeling back into them. If he’d had to use his gun now, he’d never be able to pull the trigger. Beside him Bodie’s dark head was set at an angle, listening intently.

“Let’s get them in the shed. Watch that side Stuart, the tapes a bit loose. Did Dennis say when he’d be back?”

“Not till morning.”

“Damn, I needed to ask him what he wants me to do with the film.”

“You know Frank, you really ought to get the phone connected out here.”

Doyle’s heart sank and he looked at Bodie. Bodie’s dark eyes were staring straight back at him. And if George Cowley could have seen the look they exchanged he would have been well pleased. Because that single look was all that was needed to communicate what had to be done and together they slid off the roof and away out of the light into the surrounding foliage.

****************

“Sir, report in from the Met that might be what we are looking for.” Betty’s shapely legs carried her through the door and to her boss’s desk, where Cowley was discussing their next move with Grimsby and Turner. He dropped the report he was holding, instead taking the single sheet of paper she presented.

“Two men fighting on top of an army vehicle.” He read in disbelief. “Time approximately 11.40.”

“Ties in with Doyle’s call.” Grimsby noted. “Only who was fighting who? Could explain the lost RT, Doyle was surprised while he was trying to call in.”

“Aye, but we heard Bodie on the tape, where was he while his partner was being ambushed. And why didn’t the pair of clowns use their guns. It’s why we issue them after all.”

The answers weren’t forthcoming.

“What location?” Turner asked finally.

“Intersection between Wharf Street and Prince Avenue. Send Turpin and Clarke down there and see if they can find anything at all, and get them to interview the complainer while they’re at it.”

“Yes sir,” Betty took the report back and took herself off to her desk, watched admiringly by Grimsby and Turner, despite the agents being nearly old enough to be her father.

“Do you two mind?” Cowley said acidly. “Get on to the Defence Department, find out who had one of their vehicles on that road at that time.”

“Yes sir,” Both men headed for the door.

Cowley fumed and stared at the tape recorder. Thoughtfully he played it again. Heard the noise of the vehicle, the strain of the gears, the blaring horns, Bodie’s curse and Doyle’s angry voice. He didn’t hear any evidence of a fight. What the hell had happened to them? Why hadn’t they made contact by now if they were able to? The alternative didn’t bear thinking about. Not when he’d pushed them into active duty a good month before he should have done. And against Dr Ross’s recommendations.

The noise of the lorry finally penetrated, nagging at him and he flicked the replay again. The engine rumbled and shook and Cowley suddenly realised that what he was hearing wasn’t a well-maintained army truck. It was old and in some badly needed repair. He limped purposefully towards the door and stuck his head around to his secretary. “Get on to Turner and Grimsby, tell them to track down all vehicles sold privately outside the army in the last ten years. And get Turpin onto that witness and get a reliable description of the army lorry. Get back onto the Met, tell them I want to know of any army vehicle that may have been seen traveling between 11.30 and now on any road headed out of London.”

***********************

“What now Sherlock” Bodie asked quietly as he and Doyle crouched in the damp undergrowth of the overgrown garden opposite the window. “What if your mate doesn’t come back in the morning?”

“Then I’ll get one of his friends to take me to him.” Doyle said determinedly. He still had a fine tremor running through his body and he rubbed his hands together briskly trying to get the numbness from his fingers. “In the meantime…”

“In the meantime, lets have a look around shall we?” Bodie invited. He was in his own terrain now. It wasn’t Africa by any standard but it was grass and earth and trees, all things he was used to and his mood lifted substantially.

“Don’t get caught.” Doyle admonished him. “I want Ferguson, Bodie and if he suspects for one minute…”

“Yeah yeah yeah.” Bodie reached out and ruffled his partner’s curls, trying to defuse Doyle’s tension. “You worry too much.”

Doyle ducked away, half exasperated. “Wait till they go inside and we’ll see what they went to so much trouble to get at the docks.”

“Yeah.” Bodie smirked, ready for action. He patted his side, glad now for the weight of the gun, oblivious to the chaffing of the holster in his adrenaline rush. Doyle flexed his fingers and waited, eyes fixed unblinkingly on Stuart and Frank as they unloaded the last of the boxes and carried them into the shed.

Finally the last load was carted in and the men casually had a cigarette while locking up. Doyle fidgeted but Bodie was like a statue, waiting, watching the men by the shed door. “You need to eat more.”

“Eh?” Doyle angled his head towards Bodie.

”I can feel you shivering from here. If you had more weight on you wouldn’t be cold.”

“If I wasn’t crouched in a damp garden in the middle of the night, I wouldn’t be cold.” Doyle retorted and returned his attention to the house.

“Here we go Sunshine.” Bodie grinned and cracked his knuckles. Stuart and Frank had finally entered the house, shutting the door behind them. They waited another five minutes after the lights went out to be sure and then padded silently over to the shed door. Bodie lifted the padlock in disgust. “Great, there’s that gone.”

But Doyle had pulled a set of lock pickers from his pocket. Bodie looked down surprised as he inserted them into the padlock. “Where’d you learn that then?”

Doyle said: “Old skill.”

Bodie said: “Useful skill.”

Doyle grunted as he twisted the slim metal rods and Bodie watched with interest. “Bit of B&E in your formative years eh? Not always a DC then…DC Doyle.”

Doyle gave him a pained look as the lock sprang open. “You mean to tell me, that in all your jungle hopping you never learned to pick a lock?”

“There wasn’t much of a lock to pick after we shot the door to bits.” Bodie informed him primly.

“Didn’t think mud huts had doors at all.” Doyle looked carefully around and then inside. The boxes were lumped against the wall barely visible against the dark night. The smell of straw was strong in the air.

“You need to teach me that.” Bodie said abruptly serious as he stepped cautiously inside after his partner. “Don’t suppose you know how to produce a light that can’t be seen either. If they look out they’ll see the doors open.”

He pulled the doors shut and darkness immediately enveloped them.

 

************************************

The hour hand of the clock in Cowley’s office was creeping towards the four before they finally got the break they were looking for.

“Police van setting up a radar unit saw an army vehicle on the motorway that fits our description.” Grimsby reported entering Cowley’s office with a printout from the Met in his hand. He passed it over to his boss. “The two men on duty remember it for the racket it was making. But it wasn’t speeding and they don’t normally pull over Defence vehicles so they let it go. Matches the description given by that witness that Turpin interviewed.”

Cowley turned to the map and traced the motorway in question. “Have we got the sale lists for the outmoded vehicles yet?”

“Not yet sir, they’ll take some time, and they could have changed owners again after the first sale, we’d need to do a vehicle registration check. But at least now we can narrow down the search area. Provided of course that any of this, has anything to do with the lads going missing at all.”

Cowley stared at the map, at the area given by the radar unit. A rural area. Away from the bricks and mortar of central London, into a gentler countryside. What was the connection? An old wharf, a rural property and his two missing men. Obviously the truck was used to transport something. That something had come in by boat, just like his mythical surveillance job. What he had intended as another training session had abruptly become the real thing. But none of this conjecture explained why they’d disappeared. Why they hadn’t radioed in. Whether they were even alive. Cowley’s gut feeling said they were. In what shape he couldn’t say, but he held on to that gut feeling. That same gut feeling that had told him, the very first time he’d laid eyes on the pair of them, that they would be good CI5 operatives and he trusted that feeling. They were still alive. But if they’d kept him deliberately dangling, they’d wish they weren’t.

“Sir?”

Cowley looked up swiftly to see Turner admitting a policeman into the room. The uniformed constable looked ridiculously young and self conscious, pale hair and round face and eyes of bright blue. He held a plastic bag in his hand. Inside the bag were several bits and pieces, which Cowley clearly recognised as a smashed RT unit.

“Found it on the road, near where the traffic incident happened.” The constable informed him trying his hardest not to appear impressed by where he was. “Where the army lorry ran a couple of cars off the road. The officer in charge said to bring it to you.”

George Cowley took the bag holding the damaged equipment. His face was quite bleak. “I think that answers your doubts Grimsby. It would be a co-incidence indeed, to find one of our RT’s in the vicinity of a near accident involving a vehicle of such disrepair that it doesn’t go unnoticed by a traffic policeman on a motorway at the right time of night.” He glowered at the map again. “And I don’t believe in co-incidences. We’ll take my car.”

“Sir?” Turner looked up from where he had joined his partner at the desk.

“Whatever it is they’ve stumbled on, they’ll need back up and I want to be there first hand. Get Betty to forward on the list of matching vehicles and in particular any in that are registered in that area as soon as possible.”

The sky to the east was beginning to lighten as Cowley drove out of that anonymous building just off Whitehall. He was just starting to feel the effects of nearly 24 hours without sleep but he shook the effects off. He was alternatively torn between fear for his young new recruits and irrational anger at them. Cowley’s first loyalty was to CI5, but second was to his men and he backed them without question if they were in the right.

It would have to be something significant, he reasoned, regardless of how insubordinate that pair were, to have them disobey his orders and not find some way to radio in. Unless they were indeed, being held captive.

Turner was in the seat next to him, car radio transmitter on, listening to the latest reports on the ex army vehicles.

“Two in that area sir – one registered to Sir Donald Browning-Smith, and the other to Francis Lowrey. No record for either of them.”

Cowley considered the information. “Get the addresses for both.”

****************************

The boxes would have to wait, they couldn’t risk a light without knowing for sure that they wouldn’t be observed and didn’t have one in any case. Doyle was less interested in the contents of the boxes anyway and more interested in the whereabouts of Dennis Ferguson.

“I’m going to search the house.” He whispered to Bodie as they stood by the shed door.

“Taking a risk mate.” Bodie cautioned. “They may not be asleep.”

“I’ll have to take the risk.” Doyle answered. “We don’t know how many there are, or who they are or even where the hell we are.”

Bodie saw the logic of this. They’d taken note of the road signs and direction the lorry had taken, but the side roads and many turnings since the Motorway had turned them around. “OK, but we do the grounds first. Always best to have an escape route planned.”

The grounds however showed nothing of interest. The driveway to the road, which was quiet and empty, and bloody cold too, Doyle thought, feeling it swirl like mist around his legs. He was frozen stiff. Bodie, at a half crouch moved silently beside him, not even rustling a leaf with his catlike ability, led the way around the back. The rear of the house sloped gently down to a wood. How big the wood was, or where it lead to, neither of them could say, but there was a faint glow some distance across it, a small town perhaps. There were no neighbours in the immediate vicinity.

“How do people afford all this land?” Bodie asked finally. “It’d be a worth a fortune.”

“Obviously not by working for CI5.” Doyle told him dryly. His breath steamed in the cold air and he fidgeted from foot to foot. “My wages had better go up with danger money or I might join the crims.”

“Yeah.” Lips twitching, Bodie listened to the silence of the wood, punctuated occasionally by the sleepy hoot of an owl. Doyle’s dry sense of humour surfaced at the oddest times. It was the type of humour that Bodie related well to. “That’s what you get when you let a Scotsman be in charge of the budget.”

Doyle flashed his partner a grin. “Aye laddie and dinna forget it noo.”

Bodie grinned back. “Nae likely to mon nae likely to.”

Doyle laughed at him and Bodie smiled, the shared sense of the ridiculousness lightening their grim situation.

Doyle was all right. Bit too morally minded for this job but surprisingly Bodie found that he didn’t want him to lose it, to change and desensitise like he had. It was part of who Doyle was and Bodie would make sure it stayed there, that small spark of humanity that nothing had ever been able to extinguish, despite what he had experienced in the Met. Yeah Doyle was all right.

Behind them the house and its quiet occupants beckoned.

***********************

Doyle used the lock pickers again and Bodie watched with interest as he aided his work with a flat plastic card.

“Has its uses then?” he said in a low whisper nodding at the card.

“Yeah, about it’s only use these days, unless I get a pay rise.” Doyle heard the faint click of the lock and quietly pushed the door open.

“What now?” Bodie followed him in.

Doyle shrugged. “Be really quiet and look around.”

“Thought you were an expert.”

“Didn’t say that. If I was an expert I wouldn’t have become a copper would I?”

The partners moved around the room. The darkness was a hindrance until Bodie found cigarettes and a lighter on the dining room table. Quietly he handed the lighter to Doyle and indicated the stairs. Doyle nodded, understanding immediately that Bodie was going to see how many men were in the house. He took the lighter and moved to a desk jammed into a corner of the room. The desk had locked drawers but that didn’t hinder Doyle. He again employed the lock pickers and quickly had the drawers open. The yield included pens, notes, papers, paperclips, staples, the usual assortment of items found in desk drawers. Why then were they locked?

Doyle glanced cautiously over his shoulder and then flicked the lighter on. Its warmth was small but felt good against his fingers. He opened folded sheets of foolscap and emptied envelopes, but it was at the bottom of the third drawer that he came up with a book full of names and code numbers. Holding the lighter close and shielding it with his body he scanned a few pages and his eyes widened.

Bodie swiftly and silently climbed the stairs, treading carefully on each step to make sure no creaking or squeaking gave him away. The house breathed around him with the usual noises a house made in the small hours of the morning. Bodie had his gun in his hand just in case. Despite Cowley’s orders, he wasn’t going to be target practice for any maniac with a penchant for shooting first and asking questions later.

There were only two bedrooms on the upper floor, opposite a small bathroom. Bodie silently pressed himself against the wall and using the barrel of his gun pushed at the half open door of the first room. Soft snorting came from the only bed, the figure indistinct under the linen. Bodie remained stock-still and listened, before moving to the next room. A similar scene greeted him. He reached out and gently pulled the doors closed, then turned and padded silently back down the stairs. His eyes had adjusted to the dark but still it wasn’t enough to allow him a clear view of the rooms he passed through and he stepped very carefully so as not to upend anything and alert the sleeping men upstairs to intruders. The kitchen beckoned through an open doorway and Bodie’s stomach rumbled. He’d give a lot for some food and a hot drink and he knew Doyle needed something hot, dressed as inappropriately as he was. He checked the kitchen and then moved on to the dining room, seeing his partner silhouetted very faintly by the golden glow of the lighter.

Bodie was absolutely silent. He knew he was, had been highly trained to be so, but still Doyle whirled around, gun drawn with that astonishing speed he had, arm extended, the muzzle pointed squarely at him in the doorway. His left hand too, the right still clutching the lighter. Bodie froze and looked up into his partner’s hard stare. Then he rolled his eyes in a faint acknowledgement of that left handed speed, and Doyle relaxed, tilting his head in silent recognition of Bodie’s presence, arm lowering to shove the gun back into the holster. Any doubts Bodie might have had about Doyle’s instincts were banished in that one moment. How Doyle had known he was there was beyond his understanding, but from now on, any time Doyle sensed a tail, Bodie was fully prepared to believe him. He moved up beside his oppo and saw the address book in his hands. They didn’t speak, and Doyle shoved the book into an inside pocket of his jacket. He glanced at Bodie and Bodie raised his eyes heavenward and held up two fingers. Doyle nodded and checked his watch. Nearly dawn. He tilted his head to the door and Bodie nodded. They quietly let themselves out and went back to the shed.

“What was in the book?” Bodie wanted to know as he shut the door. Doyle had moved across to the boxes. He flicked the lighter on and held it up.

“Names and codes.” He answered. “Important names. There’s something shady going on all right.”

Bodie crouched down beside him and pulled a box from the pile. They were taped tightly closed, anonymous brown cardboard boxes, unmarked. Bodie dug in his pocket and pulled out his penknife. Doyle shielded the lighter as he scored a line down the tape sealing the flaps of the box, then pulled them open. Both partners bent their heads close together to see.

Film, canisters of film. Bodie picked one out and removed the casing revealing the tightly packed black roll of film. He tipped it sideways, and the end separated from the rest. Doyle held the lighter close to the unraveled bit of film spiraling from the core like a child’s hair ribbon. The images were there duplicated over and over, minute movements separating one frame from another, indistinct on the celluloid but revealing enough to the partners. They didn’t need a clear view to know what it was. Bodie exhaled strongly through his nostrils in abhorrence. He had seen some shocking things in his time, but this, this from a civilised part of the world and supposedly civilised citizens was enough to tilt his well-established apathy into outraged condemnation. What it would do to Doyle…? His lips thinned and he glanced at his partner.

Doyle’s face was ashen and his eyes; those wide expressive eyes that always gave him away were staring and intense. Bodie had seen hate before and he’d seen rage. Doyle’s face showed a terrible combination of the two and more besides. If anything was likely to flare up Doyle’s strong moral code and even stronger sense of justice, it would be child abuse, and it would ultimately jeopardise their presence, if not their lives, if it got out of hand and ran rampant. Bodie considered his partner as he opened another box, revealing pamphlets and magazines of the same shocking material. Doyle was utterly still, unmoving, but Bodie could sense the conflict emanating in waves from that immobile body. He’d need to be very very careful with him until they got this bastard Ferguson.

“Pedophile ring.” Doyle finally spoke in a flat harsh voice. “That address book. I’m going to get Ferguson this time. I’m going to get all of them.”

“Not you’re not.” Bodie stood up abruptly and leaned in closer to Doyle. To get through to him.

Doyle’s gaze shot up from the boxes and he looked straight into Bodies intense midnight blue eyes. He looked much as he had the day he’d thrown that first punch in their bust up on the obstacle course. Bodie wasn’t going another round with Ray Doyle.

“We are.” said Bodie.

Outside the darkness began to lift.

 

 

 


	4. Doyle & Bodie - Beginnings Part 4

Chapter 9

Turner consulted the map on his knees while he thumbed the radio microphone. Betty didn’t sound like she’d been up all night chasing registration numbers. She sounded as cool calm and sexy as always. Grimsby in the back had pen and paper and was jotting down the addresses as Turner repeated them.

“Five in all” Turner said, smoothing the map, “The first two are still the most promising.”

“Which one is closest?” Cowley asked, turning off the motorway right behind a large cumbersome horse trailer. He eased up on the accelerator masking his irritation at the delay.

“Browning-Smith.” Turner said, running a finger along the lines on the map. “He’s not going to like being woken this early.”

Cowley didn’t bother answering that. If he was innocent then he’d make his apologies, if he wasn’t, if he’d been involved in the disappearance of his two operatives, well then he’d have to get used to early mornings where he’d be going.

The road would have been pleasant in any other circumstance. Fairly quiet, the trees wearing their autumn colours, leaves dropping steadily like multi coloured large snowflakes. Cowley followed the horsebox a good deal slower than he would have liked. The sun rose higher.

“Anything from 4.5 or 3.7?” Turner asked Betty.

“Negative 1.9.”

Turner glanced at his boss, saw the lines etched deep around mouth and eyes.

“There’ll be a good reason Sir,” he said trying to keep the old man’s fears at bay. Turner knew he was beating himself up over sending the young-uns into that warehouse in an effort to get them to bond. Even if Cowley would never admit to it.

“There’d better be.” Cowley growled. “Or they’ll be on desk duties for a year.”

Turner swung his head to the window to smile briefly. The old man wouldn’t admit the worst either. He had too much faith in the men he selected for CI5. Turner didn’t share that faith in this instance. If neither of them had managed to find a phone by now and report in, then it wasn’t looking good. He’d occasionally seen them training over the last month or so, when he’d been checking in at base and had recognised their potential. Good agents yes. If they were still alive.

The horsebox maddenly continued on the same route and the road was too winding to overtake. Cowley inched out every so often but the road was narrow and impassable.

“Take the next left sir.” Turner instructed looking up from the map.

Sir Donald Browning-Smiths country abode was well manicured, well kept and opulent in its appearance. Stables, in better condition that some tenements in the East End, nestled to the side of the drive. Hunters were being led out and saddled despite the early hour. Browning-Smith himself was there shouting orders over the baying of dogs which ran in excited circles around the legs of the expensive horses. Spectacularly attired, he was a large and beefy man and well used to getting his own way. Hair of iron and a matching bristling moustache framed small eyes of a pale watery blue.

Cowley pulled up in the middle of this chaos and alighted from the car. Turner and Grimsby followed, flanking him, eyes taking in everything.

“Who the devil are you?” Browning-Smith demanded when Cowley stepped in front of him. ID was produced, flashed under the affluent man’s florid face. Sir Browning-Smith gazed at the ID then to the shrewd hard man holding it.  
“What the devil do you want, I’m about to go on the hunt.”

Cowley glanced around, an amused smile playing about his mouth. “Aye, so am I. Sir Browning Smith, so am I. I am told that you own an old Army troop carrier.”

Sir Browning-Smith looked surprised. “Why yes of course I do. Collect them you see. Mementoes if you like, from my service days.”

“May I see it?”

“What! Now?” the older man bristled. “And delay my hunt.”

“It is rather important Sir, if you don’t mind.”

“Well step smartly then man.” Sir Browning-Smith turned and led the way back towards the stables. Cowley glanced at his agents and gave them a meaningful look. Turner and Grimsby immediately melted away to do their own searching.

Cowley was led to a well-constructed shed beyond the stables. It was large and airy and Sir Browning-Smith produced a key to unlock the door. Cowley stepped inside. A museum greeted him, old uniforms, weapons displayed in glass cases, equipment that had last seen the light of day during the war. And standing in solitary splendour in the middle of the shed, a beautifully restored army troop carrier, circuit 1940.

“It’s still registered for road use?” Cowley stepped over admiring the vehicle.

“Of course it is, we use it for the rally’s, held twice a year. I keep her in top condition if that’s what this is all about.”

“Do you have the keys?” Cowley turned to Sir Browning-Smith whose face was a study in impatience, but he nonetheless pulled out the same set of keys with which he’d used to unlock the doors of the shed and selected one, separating it from the others before giving it to Cowley. Cowley opened the driver’s door and hauled himself up into the leather seat ignoring the stab from the bullet still lodged in his leg. He pushed the key into the ignition and turned it. The engine cranked once, then roared into life before settling down into a well-maintained purr.

Sir Donald Browning-Smith looked perplexed as Cowley switched off the engine and stepped down.

“My apologies for disturbing the hunt and thank you Sir Browning-Smith.”  
He handed the keys back and limped towards the door.

“Major Cowley?”

“Aye,” Cowley paused at the door to see Browning-Smith standing where he had left him, an altogether different expression on his face.

“Good luck with your own hunt.”

Cowley nodded. “Thank you Sir.”

Grimsby and Turner were waiting by the car.

“Well.” Cowley demanded as they got in.

“Nothing Sir.” Turner admitted.

“Not a whisper.” Grimsby added.

“Next address.” Cowley said and spun the wheel sending gravel skittering across the driveway. Behind them, dogs barked and horses snorted and men shouted orders.

“Francis Lowrey.” Grimsby said. “On the outskirts of a small village, lives alone on a pension.”

*********************

The smell of frying bacon wafting across from the house had Bodie’s stomach protesting loudly. He and Doyle had left the shed and were now back in the overgrown garden where they could see both the house and the shed and the driveway. Stuart and Frank were up early and Doyle took that as a good sign. It could mean that Ferguson was expected early. He said as much to Bodie when Bodie complained about sitting all day in a garden on an empty stomach. It was still cold and Doyle had his hands in his pockets flexing his fingers trying to keep them warm. He was glad of the simmering anger, still boiling beneath his skin, keeping the fatigue at bay. He’d been unable to sleep as wired as he was, instead keeping watch, while Bodie kipped down in the old straw for a couple of hours and his lack of sleep was pulling at his eyes.

“We should sort those two first.” Bodie pointed out. “We don’t have extra ammunition Doyle.”

“If we take them, they won’t act like Ferguson is expecting. Any little thing could warn him.” Doyle explained again. “He did it last time. He’s not getting away Bodie.”

“Yeah but what if he brings some heavies. There’s three already, if there’s more you’d better be careful where you shoot and make it count.”

Doyle’s simmering anger bubbled. “You think I won’t be able to shoot them?”

Bodie studied his partner. In Doyle’s current frame of mind, he wasn’t sure what he’d do or what he’d notice. A man could get his head blown off being that single-mindedly focused. “I’m just telling you that there may be more than you are expecting. Wasting bullets might tilt the odds in their favour.”

“You just look after Bodie.”

“Yeah.” Bodie muttered. “And I’ll watch your back too.”

He turned to see Doyle staring at him, his eyes distant, as though remembering something else from a long time ago. Something unpleasant. Trying to reassure his partner, Bodie said quietly: “It’s what I do.”

Doyle was saved from answering by the door opening. Frank came out with a piece of toast in his hands, still chewing. Bodie glanced at his watch. Nearing eight thirty. They’d tidied up the boxes as best as they could, hiding the opened ones at the back, but it wouldn’t take a genius to know someone had been in the shed. They had hoped that Frank and Stuart would have no reason to go back in there before Ferguson turned up.

The noise of a car penetrated the morning chatter of birds and Doyle tilted his head in the direction of the road. The car slowed down, turning. Frank continued to the shed. Bodie tensed beside him, eyes on Frank. The car crept slowly along the driveway to the house. Doyle pulled his gun from his holster, checked it and left it ready in his right fist.

Frank had reached the shed was jiggling his keys with one hand, while cramming the remainder of his toast into his mouth with the other. Bodie’s eyes flicked constantly from Frank, trying to see if he was armed, to the house where Stuart was. The car came closer. Doyle was coiled as tight as a spring.

A Ford Granada cruised slowly from the leafy drive to pull to a stop next to the army lorry. There were three men in the car. Doyle’s intense gaze never left the driver. Ferguson, he was sure of it. But the engine was left running and the three just sat there. Careful. They were being careful. Why?

Doyle inhaled with a hiss, eyes fixed on Ferguson. Bodie glanced at him sharply, acutely aware that his partners attention was at the point where he was almost oblivious to danger from anywhere else. Frank had unlocked the shed. Bodie had half his attention on his partner and half on Frank. Frank entered the shed. The sound of another car approaching came from the road.

“C’mon, c’mon, get out of the car you bastard.” Doyle muttered beneath his breath. His legs were trembling with the need to leap up and sprint to the car, haul him out.

Bodie flicked him another quick assessing look, but a yell from the shed had his sleek dark head swinging back. Frank came barreling out of the shed and straight for the door to the house.

“Someone’s been in there, someone got in!”

The unknown car from the road was slowing turning, entering the property. The Ford Granada’s reverse lights snapped on and the engine revved. They were doing a runner, they’d heard Frank!

Doyle exploded from the undergrowth like a guided missile intent on target. Stuart appeared at the door of the house, shotgun in his hands. He saw Doyle tearing across the clearing to the reversing Granada and lifted the shotgun, taking aim.

Bodie surged upright, handgun up and pointed and his face was hard and unyielding, violence promised and delivered. He fired twice and Stuart dropped like a stone. The blasts echoed around the house shattering the peace of the countryside. Frank spun around, lifting hands in the air, face white and terrified. Doyle kept his attention on the Ford, which was now trying to turn around, trusting Bodie completely to watch his back. Bodie was haring across to Stuart, kicking the shotgun away.

The new car turning into the driveway abruptly accelerated in response to the gunfire. It shot out of the leafy overhangs and hauled up in a skid right in front of the Ford effectively boxing it in. Ferguson, seeing he was trapped opened the driver’s door, scrambled out and fairly flew towards the house, disappearing around the side of it, but the other two men in the car, on the passenger side weren’t so lucky.

Doyle roaring in rage, fired off a couple of shots at his quarry, but the lorry was in the way. He made to follow Ferguson, but the two remaining men raised weapons, turning in his direction. All hell broke loose. Gunfire seemed to come from several directions at once. Doyle flung himself sideways, behind the lorry’s tyres, survival instincts automatically engaging, overriding his initial impulse to keep going after Ferguson. Bodie’s head came up instantly, saw Doyle sprawled on the ground, and without hesitation clouted Frank over the head with the butt of his gun. Frank went down for the count and Bodie was running for his partner, keeping the lorry between him and the gunfire.

“Doyle, are you hit?”

“No.” Doyle shouted, fury breaking his voice. “He’s getting away.”

He made to get up, reckless in his rage, but Bodie got a fistful of his collar and hauled him back down.

“What are you doing?” Doyle hissed, trying to break free.

“Watching your back.” Bodie hissed back threateningly. “He’s not worth dying for Doyle.”

Doyle struggled but Bodie was firm. Doyle glared up at Bodie looming over him, left hand trying to prise Bodie’s grip off his collar. Bodie stayed calm, in control, reining in Doyle’s temper, using it.

“You’ve got a partner now whether you like it or not mate. We’ll get him.”

Gradually he saw some of the recklessness leave Doyle’s face, those greenish blue eyes become a tad calmer, clearer, aware again. Much better. Bodie let him go and nodded.

The gun battle was still raging on, and both agents peered around the tyres. They saw the two men that had been in Ferguson’s car pinned down behind the doors of the Granada. And they saw the other car, slewed sideways blocking the exit from the property. Bob Turner and Michael Grimsby were returning fire.

Cowley, crouched beside the driver’s door looked up and saw them. Saw his two mismatched young operatives alive and unharmed and relief flew briefly across his face before he adjusted it into a peevish exasperated expression. “What the devil are you two doing?”

He sounded as though they’d skipped out to buy sweets. Doyle ignored his boss, worked his way down to the far side of the Lorry

“Going to get the other one.” Bodie yelled back and followed Doyle.

“Wait. Doyle, Bodie!” Cowley shouted, but saw he was wasting his breath.

Insubordinate pair of…he firmed his lips in resigned acceptance of the situation. Whatever those two tearaways had got themselves involved in, at least they were alive, and this shootout proved it was something significant.

Turner and Grimsby had been partners for years. They knew each other quite well. Grimsby drew the fire and Turner circled around, finally coming at the men from behind. Turner put a bullet in the leg of one, before the other threw his down his gun. Cowley came up from the car but Doyle and Bodie had disappeared behind the house.

“Finish up here, call for back up.” He instructed Grimsby and Turner and followed his two younger agents. He was just in time to see them enter a wood at the back of the house. Mouth set in a firm line; he retraced his steps back to the car to see Turner standing guard over the handcuffed prisoners and Grimsby appearing from the shed.

“Something you need to see here Sir.” Grimsby called and waited while Cowley limped over to him before indicating the interior of the shed and its damning evidence.

When Cowley reappeared he looked very nearly as angry as Doyle had, mouth set in a thin line and eyes glittering furiously. Frank had come around and Cowley marched over, ignoring the pain in his leg, face hard and unforgiving.

“Who was the man that got away?” he enquired of Frank who was holding his head looking very white and nauseous.

Frank wasn’t loyal by any stretch of the imagination, nor was he averse to saving his own neck. The limb of Satan who had clouted him over the head was one thing, but this ruthless unyielding man was another entirely, maybe even more so judging by the air of authority he carried with him. To Frank the game was up and there was little point in fighting.

“Dennis Ferguson. This is all his doing, I was only earning a few bob letting them keep the stuff here.”

Cowley was taken aback by the name, blurted unhesitatingly by the man on the ground. Ferguson! He knew of Dennis Ferguson, knew the crimes he was guilty of. Doyle also knew Ferguson quite well, having been part of the team working on the case involving the missing children. It had been detailed in his file; one of the few unsolved ones Doyle had been part of.

If Doyle had sighted Ferguson at the wharf, and it certainly seemed likely that he had, Cowley, his orders and CI5 would have gone flying out the window; taken a back seat to the chance of nabbing the elusive nutter. Cowley couldn’t blame him, but it couldn’t go unremarked either. This disobeying of orders could quite easily become a habit he may not be able to break.

He got in the car and studied the map. The other side of the wood led out into the small village. Ferguson would likely try and find a car in which to escape. He’d head for the village. Cowley started up his car and reversed back down the driveway, leaving Turner and Grimsby at the house waiting for back up and the local police.

**********************  
 **Chapter 10**

 

Ferguson had well and truly vanished by the time the partners crashed to a halt just inside the wood. Trees loomed, low bushes grew thickly around them, and the grass was long and turning brown with the approaching winter. Ivy grew in abundance, a green mantle over Autumn’s golden cloak.

“Great, ruddy marvelous.” Doyle snarled, wanting badly to hit something, anything and he eyed Bodie wrathfully. “How do we know which way he went?”

“Elementary my dear Watson.” Bodie stepped forward and scanned the ground. It wasn’t Africa but the art of tracking was the same. He pointed out the broken twigs of a small bush at ground level. “He went that way.”

Doyle looked where Bodie had pointed but didn’t see, didn’t notice the pathway laid before him by Ferguson’s flight. “How’d you know?”

“I didn’t spend all my time in Africa with young hot women.” Bodie said and smirked. “Just most of it.”

Doyle gave him an exasperated look. “Bodie…”

Bodie lifted both hands. “Ok Ok,” he turned and confidently began to follow Ferguson’s trail. “Still, a city boy like you should have had boy scouts? Tut Tut, didn’t you learn anything where you grew up?”

Doyle said: “Yeah I learned how to pick locks.”

“I learned how to pick up girls.”

“Well you didn’t learn very well then did you?”

Bodie smiled and continued trying to get one up on Doyle as he moved forward.

Doyle was sharp enough to know what Bodie was doing. Keeping a grip on reality and more importantly keeping Doyle’s grip on the situation steady. The silly bantering, as inappropriate as it was, reminded him of Syd and his tenseness eased a little. Syd would joke to defuse his temper as well. Bodie was all right, drive you crazy if you let him, never knew when to stop but he was OK. He was a solid and reassuring presence during trouble, Doyle had no worries trusting Bodie to watch his back when the firing started back at the house. And he was not as nonchalant to immorality as he liked to let on; Doyle had seen his face with that film in the shed. Before he’d been able to cover it up with that deadpan expression he was so good at. Yeah, Bodie was all right.

He followed his partner careful to keep behind him.

Bodie stopped frequently, searched intently, finding the slight indent of shoe, more broken branches, upturned stones in the damp earthy ground. He could sense Doyle itching to go faster, to get ahead and simply run. He was so close behind Bodie, looking over his shoulder, trying to spot the signs that the ex mercenary could see so clearly, he was bumping into him. Occasionally a snapping sound, like the sound of dry twigs crushed underfoot came to them from up ahead. Bodie hoped it was Ferguson and not someone just out walking their dog. He took comfort in the fact that whoever was making the noise seemed to be in the same direction as the trail and seemed to be doing their damnedest to be quiet about it. Time ticked away.

Gradually, though, other sounds came to them, an echo that gave both agents a cold feeling inside. It was the sound of children shouting and laughing. Bodie glanced back at Doyle. Doyle took a firmer grip on his gun and nodded. Bodie led the way. The wood was thinning, trees giving way to grass, the slope of the land led upwards to where a children’s playground sat, gleaming in the mid morning light on the edge of a housing estate. The street lay beyond; cars parked neatly one behind the other next to the footpath.

Small children, too young for school were playing on the equipment, lined up at the slides, pushing each other on the swings. Several mothers sat on the park benches, some with prams beside them, others reading magazines, chatting among themselves. Doyle stopped and touched Bodie’s shoulder. Bodie glanced across and Doyle indicated to the left with a tilt of his curly head. Bodie nodded, they would split and circle around, find Ferguson.

Bodie angled towards the right, towards the mothers sitting on the park benches, keeping his eyes open and listening intently. He was silent, putting his feet down carefully, avoiding the crunching of leaves and twigs trying to hear the telltale signs of Ferguson’s whereabouts. To the left he could faintly hear Doyle moving, although his partner was trying hard to be quiet.

“Boo!” A voice said suddenly at the level of his knees. Bodie nearly jumped out of his skin. He looked down, automatically swinging the gun in the same direction and saw a small girl, pale blond hair in curls all over her head and a wide grin plastered across her small elfin face, poking her head out of a particularly dense snarl of ivy. She was huddled down in a bright red coat clutching a doll that had seen better days.

He hurriedly tucked the gun into his pocket.

“I scared you.” said the tot in delight and giggled  
.  
“You did.” Bodie was irresistibly charmed by her. She looked like she should be sitting on top of a Christmas tree as innocent as an angel. She clutched the doll and giggled at her success in having startled him. His mood lifted as he grinned back at her, thinking the world was such a funny place, death despair and war in the headlines every day, and yet it still could produce such a happy little ray of sunshine as this child and be the better for it.

Then, like a dose of cold water, he abruptly remembered who he was looking for. “Where’s your mummy?”

The girl pointed. “Over there.”

Bodie nodded. “Well you go back to mummy and stay with her.”

He waited until she obediently got up on sturdy little legs and skipped in the direction of her mother then he continued prowling towards the road, eyes everywhere, taking in everything.

He watched the child reach her mother, who was standing, hands on hips looking about distractedly, obviously searching for her wayward offspring. Yummy mummy too, Bodie thought, checking her out by sheer force of habit. The mother spoke a few words and turned to pick up a bag and the little girl skipped ahead, curls to rival Doyle’s bouncing on her shoulders. The young mother moved slower, fishing about in her bag, the child danced ahead and Bodie caught movement from the edge of the woods to his right. A man shot out from behind a large holly bush. He moved fast, dodging around behind the park benches and rubbish bins on a direct line with the child and her mother.

Bodie saw what was going to happen. He saw it clearly, as though it already had. He lifted the gun but there were children running and leaping in his line of vision. The object of his aim was darting about like a fish after surface flies. Bodie began to yell out a warning but it was too late.

Knowing he was being hunted, Ferguson was like a shadow using people and the benches and trees for cover. He moved towards the cars and on the way, almost as though he wasn’t even thinking about it, he scooped up the little girl. Bodie’s mind clicked over, the implications of that ramming home harder than a hammer on a nail. He was out of the woods, gun in hand and sprinting. The mother, still rummaging in her bag hadn’t yet noticed anything amiss. Ferguson brought the child up, using her as a shield as he faced Bodie, still moving backwards towards the cars.

Bodie’s blur of movement finally had the mother’s head snapping up. She saw Bodie coming at her and her eyes widened, her mouth opened but then Bodie was flying past her and she turned to follow his direction and saw….saw her daughter snagged in the arms of a man. An older, greying man, with an awful leering look on his face and a gun in his hand. She dropped her bag and her mouth opened. “Emma!”

At the sight of the weapon Bodie skidded to an abrupt halt. His own arm was extended, gun aimed, he could see Ferguson, see his face, desperate and cunning. The little girl, Emma looked wide eyed at the sudden turn of events, clutching her doll tightly to her chest. Those big blue eyes sought her mother and her mother was suddenly scrabbling forward. “Emma!”

Bodie put out a hand to stop her, but she shook him off.

“Don’t move.” Ferguson shouted to her and she stopped suddenly, face white, horrified gaze never leaving the gun, snugly pointed into her daughter’s neck. “Anybody moves and I’ll kill her.”

Bodie felt sweat break out across his forehead. He knew the mother was going to ignore the command, saw her tense ready to fling herself forward again, maternal instincts kicking in and with it the desperation to abandon common sense and protect her offspring. He latched on to her arm more firmly.

“Don’t” he said harshly and gripped hard enough to force her gaze away from the scene in front on her, down to her arm and then up to his face. What she saw did nothing to reassure her. Bodie looked ferocious, eyebrows down, eyes blazing and mouth hard and angry. His gun was still aimed steadily at Ferguson. Ferguson was shifting the child, ducking his head behind her. He’d moved behind another park bench, the cars enticingly at his back.

“Give me your keys.” He said hurriedly to the mother, not taking his eyes from Bodie. She stared at him pale and disbelieving, uncomprehending.

Where the hell was Doyle? Not daring to risk a look for his partner, Bodie said to her: “Keep calm.”

“Give me your keys.” Ferguson screamed, and other heads came up, mothers turning, craning to see what was happening.

“Give me Emma.” The mother said, voice trembling, face starting to crumple, shock giving way to fear. “Give me my daughter.”

Ferguson was still backing up, “Give me the keys or I’ll shoot your daughter.”

She bent down, seized her bag and scrambled around in it, fingers shaking, unable to latch on to anything. Bodie waited, waited for his chance, mind on full alert, considering, assessing and discarding possible action plans in rapid succession. If he’d had a rifle, Ferguson would already have a hole blasted in his head. Bodie was sure with a rifle, could have taken him from the woods the minute he’d run from cover. But Doyle was the handgun expert. Doyle could take him easily. Where the hell was he?

Emma looked at Bodie with wide blue eyes. Bodie kept the gun trained, but the child filled his vision. He couldn’t risk the child. Where in Christ’s name was Doyle? Ferguson was now at the cars and the mother, sobbing now, threw the keys to him. Bodie moved forward as well.

Ferguson grinned nastily at him, sure he’d won. “Which car?”

“The Fiesta.” The mother said faintly, choking. “The blue one.”

He backed up quickly and moved sideways to the vehicle, keeping the child as a shield. Bodie moved forward again, closer, eyes never leaving the pair, waiting for the opportunity. The car was unlocked. Ferguson knew Bodie would be after him the minute he let go of the kid. Knew he’d have little chance to escape. Knew what he’d have to do to get away clean. Still smiling a nasty smile of triumph at Bodie he removed the gun from the child’s neck and took careful aim. Bodie froze. He knew what was going to happen and his finger tightened on the trigger of his semi auto ready to take the risk and fire before Ferguson did. A sudden vision of Emma’s fair curly head exploding in blood and brains, her blue eyes blank and staring and he stopped abruptly sweating and clammy. Jesus Christ.

“Good bye copper.” Ferguson called and not taking his eyes from Bodie, taunted him by kissing very softly, the side of Emma’s fair cheek. Bodie felt sick and a helpless rage consumed him. Dimly he heard a faint growl of fury from somewhere behind and to his left. Ferguson squeezed the trigger of his gun. A shot blasted across the park.

Pandemonium broke out. Screaming mothers were hurrying to their children, people were running, fleeing the park. A car screeched to a halt across the road in front them. Eyes wide, mouth slightly open, chest heaving as though he’d been running very fast, Bodie stared at Ferguson. Emma fell to the ground as Ferguson’s grip on her loosened. Close, too damn close. Ferguson himself was splayed back against the Fiesta, a round hole in the center of his forehead, a spray of blood and gore across the bonnet of the car behind him. Crying now, the child ran to her mother who scooped her up, sobbing hysterically.

Fiercely Bodie drew in a rattled breath and said pugnaciously: “Who are you calling copper?”

But his voice was shaky and it was several seconds before he could turn around. He already knew who’d be there, backing him up. Only one man could have pulled off a shot as tricky as that.

Doyle stood behind and slightly to the left of him, still in the shooting stance, knees slightly bent, arms extended, both hands still gripping the butt of his browning, knuckles as white as his face.

_“But the thousandth man will stand your friend with the whole round world agin you.”_ Bodie quoted softly as he gazed at his partner.

Cowley alighted from the car and hurried to Ferguson, removing the gun from the nerveless fingers. He had seen the drama unfolding as he pulled up, knew there’d been no choice about the outcome. He looked across to his two mismatched agents. Cowley looked at them both and he saw them. Saw what they had done and what it had cost them. Saw Doyle, standing frozen and saw Bodie, fierce and predatory. For a minute nobody moved, it was eerily silent, punctuated only by the sobbing of Emma’s mother.

Then Bodie moved towards Doyle and Cowley nodded slightly, approvingly, knowing instinctively that it was only Bodie that could reach Doyle now. Only Bodie, who had once been where Doyle now was, and had learned to live with it. And so would Doyle. Cowley was certain of it. He left his two newest agents to themselves and instead veered to the hysterical woman who was in imminent danger of smothering the daughter she had nearly lost.

********************************

**Chapter 11**

 

“Doyle?”

Bodie took in his partner. Doyle hadn’t moved. His face was chalk white but still determined, jaw clenched with resolve. The greenish blue eyes, normally so revealing were blank. He didn’t acknowledge Bodie, didn’t react to his name. Bodie brought his hand up, gently pushed down on Doyle’s right forearm, feeling the muscles hard and rigid, the slight tremble from the tight grip on the gun.

 

Gently Bodie said: “Ray?”

It was his given name, uttered by his partner for the first time, that finally penetrated, had Doyle responding. His eyes lost their blankness and his arm, under Bodie’s insistent pressure slowly lowered. He turned his head and looked at his partner. Bodie gazed back steadily at him, midnight blue eyes intense and alive. He could see Doyle’s thoughts reflected on that giveaway face, clicking over at their usual phenomenal pace, reviewing what had just happened.

“He wasn’t going to let her go.” Doyle said eventually, his voice husky but steady.

“No.”

“He would have taken her with him and we would have found what was left of her weeks later.”

“Yes” Bodie said fiercely, his own visions concerning the fate of that bright little girl still too disturbing, still haunting him.

“He would have shot you, killed you.”

Bodie nodded, prepared to lead the way, but it was clear Doyle was arriving there on his own. Doyle looked down at his gun, still in his right hand. His thumb caressed the barrel, still warm. The park was silent now, the wind brushing the trees, lifting the curls from his neck, cold and caressing.

“Does it get easier?”

Bodie studied his partner carefully for a minute before glancing at Cowley who was helping the mother up, talking soothingly to her.

“No.” he said, brutally honest, knowing he had to be for Doyle to believe him. “No it doesn’t.” He turned back to Doyle and said very firmly. “But the justification does.”

He waited patiently but the colour was coming back into Doyle’s face now, his body relaxing, adrenaline draining away. He looked suddenly tired. Bodie watched as Doyle inhaled deeply and tucked his gun back into his holster, then flexed his fingers, attempting to get the circulation going again. Oh he’d brood for a bit and berate himself over it but Bodie wasn’t worried. He was Doyle wasn’t he? CI5 hardened and tough. Hot temper, dry humour and a curiosity that would - Bodie would bet his life on it - get him in all sorts of trouble, all mixed up in that moral code of his. The first kill was always the hardest but he knew, deep down, that what he had done was right, would regret the necessity, but not the justification and come to terms with it his own way.

Bodie was serious when he said: “If it wasn’t for you there would be two people dead today, maybe three including me, and how many in the future when he got away. And if we did take him, how many more when he got released. All those kids Ray, kids like that one up there and don’t you forget it.”

Doyle nodded and, remembering, patted his inside pocket. The notebook was there, filled with names and codes.

**************************

Cowley walked across to the sound of police sirens splitting the air as the local constabulary sped to the scene. He looked at his two truculent agents, gave a rather penetrating stare in Doyle’s direction, acknowledging that Bodie had managed to bring him back although he still looked a bit haunted. Tougher than he looked, Ray Doyle.

Cowley briefly considered which way to handle the situation and decided to be his usual brusque self. “I said no firing of weapons. You disobeyed orders Doyle.”

Bodie’s head snapped up ready to defend his partner. Doyle glanced at Bodie, then away, towards the child and her mother. It seemed to give him resolve because he squared his shoulders and returned his gaze to Cowley as defensive as his partner.

“Yes sir, I did.”

Cowley nodded, shrewdly aware of where Doyle’s thoughts were, just as he was aware of Bodie bristling indignantly beside him.

“Just as well you did. Good partners are hard to come by, not to mention expensive to replace. This is one that didn’t go wrong.”

Bodie looked understandably baffled, but Doyle’s expressive face, open as a book was easily read by his chief. Cowley smiled gruffly at him and Doyle put long guilty thoughts of Syd finally to rest. He glanced across to his current partner, alive and healthily so.

“I fancy a drink.”

Bodie visibly brightened. “And some breakfast.”

“You’ve got paperwork.” Cowley said sternly. “I want a full report on what you’ve both been up to the last twenty four hours, then you have a surveillance to finish and training to catch up on.”

He waited just long enough for them to get their backs up. “But the drinks are on me.” He took in their tired appearances now that the adrenaline wasn’t sustaining them. “And the breakfast.”

Doyle and Bodie watched as George Cowley, head of CI5 calmly turned and walked back towards his car. They exchanged glances and a thousand words were spoken in that one glance.

“Getting the hang of it?” Bodie asked as they made to follow.

Doyle tilted his head and sniffed. “Think so. What about you?”

Bodie ran his tongue along his bottom lip and considered. “Well someone’s gotta do it.”

His eyes fell on the child Emma. She was looking over her mothers shoulder, smiling at him. Bodie felt that it wasn’t such a bad job, if it meant kids like her grew up in a better world. “It might as well be us.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you two coming or not?” A peevish voice demanded from the street.

“Running all the way sir.” Bodie muttered as he and Doyle followed their boss.

****************************

**Jaicen 5,/b > 2008  
Acknowledgments to  
Pmgms  
Angelfish45  
CI5mates  
For their helpful input and advice.  
**


End file.
